Confessions, Concessions, Cures
by Pasha.D
Summary: An aftermath fic- A/u post 9x24: Being with Lauren felt like jumping off a high rise; the fall creating a hollow in her stomach, the wind tickling her exposed skin, rushing all over her. It was beautiful and exciting until it wasn't, until the ground became visible. And, then it all came rushing in... she was sure that she'd just hit the ground, they all had.
1. Chapter 1

Summary: Confessions post 9.23 and what may follow.

Disclaimer: have no (Shond)ownership of the characters and shows, simply giving some rope to my imagination.

**A/N:**

This will be slow, I like to write in a languid sort of manner, perhaps it comes from writing poetry usually, and not prose.

I do hope to continue this, if reviewers seem interested at all. But, it seems to work by itself as an open ended one-shot as well.

For those of you who hope for better line spacing, I apologise for the clutter, somehow the format never seems to translate here, but FF has a spacing option where the reader may adjust the line spacing themselves.

**A/N 2.0:**

**- **I do urge you to let me know if you find any mistakes, but if you check my profile, you'll see that I'm from India, and here we use British English, so some spellings will be different for those of you who who write in US English. So, mind that if you decided to comment on stuff like that, 'cause I can't, you know? Change _that._

__- Thoughts of the characters, internal monologues, quandaries in the mind and of the heart, sarcastic comments, original-ish phrases etc are in single quotes.

- Dream sequences or waking illusions (if any) are in italics, but that'll be fairly obvious when you read it.

- Articles and prepositions are my friends, but sometimes when we fight, they leave the page. They'll come back once I get around to reconciling with them. Which I will. I edit and re-edit like a maniac.

Alright! That's enough!

**Enjoy, dear readers.**

* * *

"So, you're sure?" She asks, finally looking up from her lap. In the last half hour, her lap had become insanely interesting, and not in a fun sexy way; it was more in that she couldn't look into those blue eyes which were sure to be pleading with her brown ones. Those eyes would do their own talking, never to be denied, but Callie was hoping this was one of those rare moments where the definition of what a joke _is_ was evading her otherwise brilliant wife.

If this wasn't what it was, if t this very moment she wasn't stuck in an almost Ibsonian play, convincing her partner that she did in fact give herself over in the most intimate way to an almost stranger, if she were on the outside looking in, Arizona was sure there would be something painfully comical about the whole thing. But, there she was, there they were, stuck in an expressionistic storm.

Every scary little thing that rattled inside her mind and heart, that came in the way of her loving Callie with everything she ever was - it was all becoming apparent. It became violent and almost tangible in every electrifying touch she'd shared with Lauren.

There was this all consuming burn Arizona felt in Lauren's presence; she was suddenly younger, everything was momentarily brighter and so she gave into it. It felt like jumping off a high rise; the fall creating a hollow in her stomach, the wind tickling her exposed skin, rushing all over her. It was beautiful and exciting until it wasn't, until the ground became visible. And, then it all came rushing in, who she was; a mother, a wife, brilliant, married to someone who didn't think to question why she loved her, or how she loved her, someone who only knew that she loved Arizona and everything else was inconsequential.

Yes, she was sure. She was sure that it happened - she was sure that she'd just hit the ground, they all had.

"Yes, Callie. It happened." She sounded calm. Arizona sounded calm, almost... cold. She should be saying more, shouldn't she? But Arizona didn't quite know what to say. 'Sorry' seemed so trite, 'I love you', 'it meant nothing'? Which stinking flower was she supposed to present to her wife out of this rather impressive bouquet of rotting old cliches? The truth of it was that Arizona did love Callie, but in everything that had happened something between them had shifted and they never stopped to fix it, she never stopped to fix it.

How many times _could_ they do that, really? And she was ashamed to have to acknowledge it all the time, 'I'm broken, we're broken, I'm damaged goods' - She was afraid to lean into these feelings. When would she live if she was always stuck in her head?! So, she ignored it, and put on a beautiful show until it all became too thin to endear to the naked eye and too heavy for her to keep at it.

Someone pulled in a shuddering breath. At this point, it could be any one of the two women sitting in the tiny office. Callie was going to have to look at Arizona at some point, she decided to rip it all off like a nasty band-aid.

She giggled a little to herself. She laugh-scoffed at the fact that now they would have to talk incessantly, which they could have done if Arizona had come to her before she 'mistakenly' decided to give into her attraction for the other blonde minted in the shiny brilliance of Hopkins-acquired-awesomeness. They would be good together, annoyingly trailing rainbows behind them in the halls when they'd passed through; giant shapely barbies. Callie wished she wasn't so irrevocably, irredeemably, stupidly in love with one of them.

The ball was in Callie's court, at least that's what it felt like, but really she despised being bullied into playing at all by her wife, by the 'wife steeling baby fixer', by the freaking situation! She dared to look at Arizona a second time in all the time that had gone on since this entire thing started.

"So, what do you want to do now?" asked Callie. "Do you want to be with her now?" Her voice cracked on that particular question; god, a yes on that one would be like a cold spike through Callie's warm fluttering heart.

"NO" came the answer, prompt and firm.

"Do you still want to be with me?" This all seemed wrong, to her, to Arizona too, really. Should not Arizona be asking that question? Should she not be begging her wife to stay? But, the question was followed by a silence that inked the air around them with a slow poison.

"I... I don't know. I want you, I want us, you Calliope, and Sophia. But, what if we try, I try and you can't forgive me? You have to try with me." Now she pleaded, tiny cracks in the stoicism that let Arizona breathe, they were becoming visibly apparent to them both. "Could you do that? Eventually? Could you forgive this? Me? Could you forgive me?"

Could she?


	2. Chapter 2

Could she?

* * *

Everything inside Callie was screaming for her to say yes. She wanted to be with Arizona, despite everything, because of everything, she _just_ wanted to be with her. But, this, this was different. She wasn't going to just neatly sweep it all under the rug and then have them both trip over said rug and fall flat on their faces. Clearly, rug stuffing wasn't working for them.

She looked at Arizona for a bit. The woman was steely and professional in everything, and when she was unsure of herself around the people that mattered most, the distancing (?), it took hold everywhere, their home, their marriage… Everything became strained and polite. But, right now, Arizona was her rare hidden self, she would never beg, but she was; she was pleading with her eyes, asking for forgiveness and giving Callie an out all at once. But, she still wasn't saying it and that scared Callie, it pissed her off and it somehow saddened her too. Wasn't she worth it being said?! Where was the loud echoing remorse? It should have been there, right? Choking apologies galore?

Arizona was hoping for clean, surgical preciseness and calculated outcomes, even now, with Callie, and about their lives. But Callie was built differently. Everything about her was big, and messy, and loud and close, involved and beautiful; it's what let her keep caring for George after their divorce. Once you had Callie – she was there to stay. Where most people mistook Callie for someone who succumbed to childish naivety, a trap Arizona too often fell into of late, she had once known that Callie's love was deep rooted, binding and wherever it took seat…it was solid. And even after, for whatever reason, you chipped away at that love, piece by piece, its dust settled there forever. It's what made Arizona both afraid and hopeful. It's what Arizona was banking on.

Every thought Callie was having circled to this blank moment filled with white noise and this lingering nausea. 'Did Arizona really expect an answer _right now?_ This very instance? Should she not be afforded the time at least to digest this unpalatable piece of information?'

It bubbled up inside her and made its way to her lips in a half chocked sob-whisper –"Oh my god! You cheated on me!" Louder now. "_You did!_ You _slept_ with someone else, and no snoring was involved and…" it seemed to die down.

Arizona looked at Callie with this terrible curiosity. She could see her wife weave in and out of this blankness - places where her mind sped up and then everything from her thoughts to her soul came to a grinding halt; as if the news of the betrayal was cyclically stale and then fresh. It was like watching a beautiful monument being demolished or coming undone; Arizona wanted to look away, but she couldn't bring herself to do it.

"…and you what? You want an answer right now?" Yes, she was now speaking in a loud angry whisper. Anger and pain, that was what Callie's voice carried in it. "I can't give you an answer right now! This? Us?! We're not a fast track court or whatever! Give me a goddamn moment, Arizona! I can't just… just soldier on! And, after everything, this question of yours?! It's selfish! And I'm over you being selfish!"

"So what?" The question came out in ragged breaths as Arizona felt the tight squeeze of dread in her chest. "What are you saying?! You won't even consider giving me, _us_, a chance?" The next thing out of her mouth was a terribly convoluted thought; a hail Mary, something to win the argument, to level the playing field, or cut Callie's leg off, (just the one) from under her – "Because I did! When… when I came back from Africa and…" She stopped; the look on Callie's face made her stop.

"Do you hear yourself right now Arizona?! We decided not to do this! You bring up _Africa?!_" Arizona had expected Callie to be louder, outraged, wailing again the shit storm that she'd finally and so perfectly brought home to them, between them. But, this, the way her wife talked right now? It didn't satisfy how Arizona had seen, almost hoped Callie would react. She should have been angrier, but here she was; a picture of quiet calm passion, anger and love and sadness and something about her eyes seemed to look like Callie wanted to understand the 'why' beyond the 'what' of what had happened between her and Lauren.

"We'd decided a long time ago… the day we were getting married in fact – that we wouldn't do this! I don't want to use of Africa and neither should you Arizona…" Callie sighed her name, like she did in that Callie way, and it hit Arizona just right; it made her feel like a mad little child, yes they'd agreed to that, but it didn't stop how she's felt about it… how she still felt about it.

"And what is the point here?! I mean you know what we'll say right?" Callie waited for a nod of confirmation, anything really that made her think Arizona was going to stop hiding behind the continental debacle, but it never came. Callie paused for a bit, then – "Arizona, we were broken up!" She did Arizona's voice next "No we weren't, I thought about you, there were sick kids and I funded the new luxury boat the guys at Kleenex bought themselves that Christmas!"

That got Arizona to smirk-smile a little.

Callie shifted to her own voice "I'm having a baby? That's what was next, right?"

That wiped the smirk off Arizona's face.

"Things happened…" Callie continued acting herself out "and you said you'd be Sophia's mom, and you are! And, we were both wrong." That got the blonde's attention, what was Callie saying? Was she now going to tell her that she was going to keep her kid from her?

Callie saw where Arizona's mind was going, she'd clinched her fists, her nails digging into her palms and she looked about ready to launch a verbal assault on the women standing in front of her. Callie spoke quickly, calmly and clearly – "No, that's not what I meant. I meant then, we were wrong not to talk, you were wrong to leave like that, and I was wrong in not having supported you - good and proper."

She huffed a little, exasperated with the blonde, but she continued nonetheless. "Let me be clear right now. Whatever happens with us, you _are _Sophia's mother and I see how dedicated you are to her. I won't…" She sighed, "this is tiring Arizona, and it feels wrong. I'm constantly defending myself and even now, I'm the one fighting for us. Don't you see how weird this is? How _absurd_ all this is?! _YOU_ sleep with someone else and somehow I have to defend the choices I made those many years ago, and maybe even the ones I'll be making right now… Does that seem fair to you?"

She could see it. Callie could see Arizona vacillating between opening up and leaning into the pain and the guilt or shutting down. She knew her wife, or maybe right now? She didn't so much, but she knew what Arizona would do. The guilt would drown her wife and that fear of drowning was what was stopping Arizona from feeling or showing her guilt, her anger at herself and her remorse.

The truth of it was that Arizona was so, so, sorry, but she was also so afraid that that wouldn't be enough for Callie, for them. And what would happen then? But, in that moment Arizona recognised what Callie meant. Yes, this was absurd and wrong in so many ways; she was grilling Callie.

"Look at me, Arizona. I… ugh! I don't want to say this now, you don't deserve it and I'm always risking myself… my self-worth, my heart, and I shouldn't have to, not after everything, not after five years, and a kid and marriage. But, I do…love you, still." She could hear Arizona's sharp intake of breath, a slight hitch; Callie heard and read relief there, and she hated that she was making Arizona feel better. It just felt wrong all over again.

"And I wish I didn't, and that it'd _just _stop! And that it'd just go away and leave me be, but it won't, and I can't not know why, and it can't just be empty references to what has happened and loaded things like 'my leg made me do it.'" She stopped. Waiting for Arizona to bulldoze her entire argument, a little sheepish at the insensitive comment about the leg, but it never came. She cleared her throat, pausing to think what to say next, but then she though against it; 'let her suffer' she thought, 'see what being left in the dust feels like' – and with that Callie began to exit the room.

Arizona, a little taken aback, went to take hold of Callie's wrist and stop her, but she couldn't handle being jerked away by her wife, so she went for and successfully caught her doctor's coat. "Callie, don't."

"This isn't you, the walking away. And, I know you want to punish me and you should, but please, please, please don't not be _you _about it. I couldn't… I don't want to change you. I know it sounds presumptuous but, you are not me, and you're not cynical and silent and the room leaving type. Don't be me, don't become this hard person…" She was crying now, Arizona was honest to god crying and Callie was constantly fighting herself in wanting to comfort her.

"Yeah, well" Callie choked out, embarrassed at how 'badass hard-core I hate you right now' that was meant to be and how 'I miss you like a love sick loser' it actually came out as. She sniffled… 'God! She freaking sniffled! She was sucking at this!' She had to speak, "You don't deserve _me_ right now, _so_…." An awkward silence followed as Callie slowly continued towards the door.

Arizona let go of the coat, but not of her own volition, Callie had dragged herself away from her grasp, slowly, heavily but sure footedly moving towards the exit. She couldn't watch Callie walk away so she zoned in on the linoleum floors looking at the slight grime that made her think to approach the board for readjusting the budget or of talking to the cleaning staff or something that was not about her and Callie.

"_No_…" That broke the blonde's floor watching-cleaning obsessed reverie. She looked up to see Callie facing her, incensed and angry; yes, this was Callie again, the one that she recognised. "This is what is going to happen… I'll move out and you have two weeks…"

Arizona's heart sped up, a humming bird in her chest "Callie, please don't…"

"Stop! Alright? Can you _just_… _Jesus!_ Arizona! Just… just let me talk; let me finish!"

Arizona pursed her lips, eyes wide and nodded, rocking on her heels, like a child. The sight almost made Callie smile, almost, until she remembered where they were and what this was…

Sighing and acknowledging Arizona's silent acceptance with a slight nod, she went on "I'll move out, and you have two weeks to find a new house or apartment or whatever, one that's not a five story walk-up with a _mostly_ reliable lift…" She cut herself off when Arizona looked about ready to protest, but her glare in turn caused the blonde to stop herself, and they were left with a slight and audible squeak that emanated from the blonde's lips and died in the air. Callie huffed a bit, but then continued…"when you have it, the place, I'll come see it, and we'll make sure it is safe for you and Sophia, for when she's over with you…" That got her a sad sloppy smile from her wife, who was now silently crying and wheezing with shut eyes crinkled at the sides and grimace like smile, sad but relieved. At that moment, what was so thoroughly unattractive to so many people was so very endearing to Callie, but she had to shake it off and continue.

"Then, I'll move back to the apartment, which if we decide to separate, I will keep." That was again met with a slight nod. 'This is what Arizona wanted, right?' She was making it easy for the blonde, calling all the shots, taking on the burden of it all and moving out of the painful inaction they were otherwise destined to get stuck in. "I'm signing over my shares to you in a… a… _deed of gift?_ Is that a thing?"

"Calliope, _no_…" there, Arizona broke some more, sighing her discontent at how final this all sounded.

"Yes._ Your leg, your pain, your money!_" Callie was getting loud now, "I don't _want_ it! Put some of it in a trust for Sophia, buy yourself a harem, _whatever_! I don't want the money, but I will keep my trust fund."

"_No_, Callie." That sounded a lot more confident that Arizona felt. "You suffered too, with me and… and I'm not doing that! Taking the money or whatever, _please!" _'Crazy! ' Arizona was feeling crazy right now, this was maddening! "_And_ you said, _IF_ we decide to separate, so why would you do this?! Divide our assets or whatever? When… when we're…" 'what? What were they? Were they still together?'

Callie put up her hands, stilling Arizona's string of ill articulated pleas. Her wife was scared, terrified of losing her, their life, their marriage, their family. _That_ much was becoming apparent and that helped calm Callie, a lot. It chipped away at her reservations about the far, far away possibility of reconciliation.

"Look, Arizona. I won't let you do this. You… _we_… the married and maybe _eventually_ together _us_, _we_ will either learn to share everything or I refuse to do this again."

Arizona looked at her in that curious and confused fashion that made Callie sure of how blind the woman was sometimes. She laugh-scoffed and queried - _"really?! You really don't know what I'm talking about?!"_ The blonde looked like she was scared to shake her head in a negative fashion, but Callie just went on. "I'm allowed the money and a seat on the board, and yeah that's great! And, sure, it matters some, because we are changing this place… but, here inside us", she waved her hands between then for emphasis and continued - "the two of us, our marriage? You never gave me the same consideration!"

"_That_ is not true!" Before Arizona could continue with the verbal outpourings of outrage, Callie quickly cut her off - "yes it is… You never let me see you in recovery, even later on. I wasn't allowed to go to PT with you…" She could see the blonde was about to protest again – "yeah, you were scared and embarrassed, but you were also punishing me! Every other month I would get this jarringly different version of you, supposedly better than you were before, but I was never allowed to _see_ you heal, and _that? _That was punishment for me. _You know it was! _'cause then you were getting better and I wasn't a part of it. I'm constantly left with this job of breaking away pieces of you, and I can't not do it because that's what you need me to do! And then you hate me for it, and you're happy hating me, because then you don't have to hate yourself! And right now?! You're going to do it again…"

Every time they revealed a piece of their wounded selves it seemed to be chased by a fast and blank silence where the pain settled and it grew, but that seemed to be the cost of understanding one another… trying to understand one another.

"Okay." Arizona affirmed and that surprised Callie. But, that clipped affirmative reply was all the agreement she'd get from the blonde. The niggling feeling of not being loved and valued enough returned again, but Callie pushed it down and went on… "that's all I have to say right now. And we'll… we can try" the next word came out in a tired frustrated sigh "_again_. But, you'll have to come to me, because I'm done chasing you! However we got here, you're the one who slept with someone else, so let's not fool ourselves! You don't play the victim, and I won't play the martyr, and when _we_ are ready to commit to recovering _you _will ask _me_. And we'll see what we'll do next…" She finished lamely, feeling spent.

"Now I'm going to go, and you are going to let me. There is a hospital full of people who need us, so we should…" she motioned towards the exit again and got a "yes", a defeated sigh of an affirmation. But she turned back again, "oh, and Arizona? Don't… don't tell anyone about this, the cheating. There's only about so much I can take without having to play the fool a second time around here, and they'd make your life hell too… So, don't…" And with that she walked out of the door, leaving behind a woman riddled with a heart that contradicted itself, questioning the drumming humming music inside her chest.

What was that bleeding into her veins?

Was it dread?

Was it remorse?

Or, was it that simple thing that lived underneath everything else, buried at the bottom, pulsing louder with every beat; making its existence known. Yes, it was that thing_ so_ hidden, it was lost to he own self for a while; it was hurt, but it was also hope, but most of all it was love.


	3. Chapter 3

**DISCLAIMER: **Not mine, any of them.

**A/N: **

Alright readers, so this is a little different and I thought I'd try it, and that it'd be fun to write. Anyway, be advised, there is gore ahead.

Also, I'm not really sure but either I'm getting no reviews, which is fine or something is wrong with FF and I'm not really getting any new notifications. If that is the case then it's a real bummer because I wanted to know what the reaction is like, because this author is greedy and needy and NOT BATMAN!

Also, yes it's definitely shorter, so I'm sorry if some of you are disappointed with that particular fact.

**A/N #2:** Should I do one for Arizona? There are a lot of those though. Also, just fixed the mistakes here, let me know if there are any more that need my attention.

Thanks.

**Anyway, Onward March**

* * *

_"So?"_

_"So, what?!"_

_"You gonna to tell me Torres? Or 'm I gonna have to pull it out from you, scratching and screaming?" _

_Callie started giggling uncontrollably._

_The burly man scratched his beard, eyes alight, a slow smirk growing at his lips, he started with a questioning look – "Torres, are you giggling?! For real?!"_

_That sobered the woman right up. "Ahem, it was a very trill laugh Mark, you should know the difference!"_

_"Heh. Okay, I'll bite! What were you __**trill**__" taking a swig of his scotch for emphasis, and because it just looked immensely cool in his head (additionally, it made his bgf roll her eyes – so win, win!) "laughing about? Trilly? Is it trilly or trill? Darn, just tell me what you were giggling about woman!"_

_A mock glare followed him as he brought up his scotch to his lips again, but she was too drunk and very eager to tell him what it was she had __giggled__ trill(y?)/ laughed about… 'what was that again? God she was drunk!'_

_'Oh, oh yeah, okay, right!'_

_"You said scratching and screaming!" there it was again, the lady-laughter! _

_"Yeah, so? You planning on making sense anytime soon Torres?!" _

_"I was thinking it could be… like the title of a really bad horror porno!" Lady-laughter, again._

_"Jeez Torres" the man guffawed… "you bury your sense of humour with me when you put me in the ground?!"_

_The smile on Callie's face dropped immediately, "what are you talking about Mark?!"_

_"You know, when you put me in the ground? Also? Inspired tombstone! 'Friend and Father'?! How long did it take you to come up with that?!" Why was he still laughing, this was decidedly unfunny._

_Realization began to creep in from the corners, her mind felt like an attic seeing sunlight after decades – "That was Derrick… he wrote that. I… ummm… You were dead!" There, she was beginning to hyperventilate some – "You died Mark."_

_Mark's smile grew a little bigger, there were odd whooshing noises and beeps, they got louder when the door to the loo at Joe's opened and when it closed they were eerily gone, like her ears were constantly popping. He was changing before her eyes, growing paler, losing muscle definition; his lips were moving towards a blue that reminded her of the door to her apartment. Then there was a knock, coming from the door to the loo. She looked over to it, "what's in there?" She asked turning around to look at her friend again, but he was gone._

_Before her was an expansive, green and wet forest. It was cold and she was suddenly walking out from under the debris of a dilapidated naval ship; it was old and rotting, all askew and half buried in the ground. _

_She walked, and kept walking till her feet hurt. Her breath became short in the shuddering cold and then she tripped over something, falling down the side of slightly elevated hill. All the forest noises were drowned out into a black blankness till she found herself coming to in a large foul smelling ditch. She patted her hands around; trying to find some leverage to push herself up except whatever she touched was soft and fleshy. She brought a hand up in front of her face and a drop of cold, thick blood trailed slowly down her finger till it jumped off the arch of the inside of her palm and landed on her cheek. _

_She elevated her head and shoulders on her elbows a little, noting again how soft and cold and wet the ground around her was. What she saw made her scream a silent scream, mouth wide open, every muscle in her body tensed as she tried to get up and slipped again, this time landing on her stomach; her hand on one of the many rotting severed legs in a sea of severed legs. _

_She looked into the forest past the pit of dead limbs to center herself and calm her rapidly beating heart. Somewhere in the distance, the forest became fluid; she saw the golden outline of a narrow strip of sand - a short shoreline slowly and languidly being kissed by a tepid sea. On that short beach she saw two beautiful blonde women, sitting in profile on a beach chair. The more petite one was snuggled in the space between the others' legs, front to back. On the petite blonde's chest lay playing, Sophia. _

_Callie stretched her hand out towards them, trying to get up again, her grip tightening around the cold fleshy stump. She brought her focus back to her immediate surroundings. _

_'She had to get up!'_

_ 'She had to get out of here!' _

_'She had to get to Sophia!' _

_When she finally focused, in front of her face was a discoloured foot attached to the dying hunk of flesh she had her left hand on, and the toes were coloured a beautiful rich red. _

_Her wife's favourite. _

Callie woke up gasping for air, unsure of why or what she'd just seen, but all she knew was that this was to be the blue print of every dream she would ever have for the next however many days. Callie Torres's nightmares had without forewarning bled into the sunlight and the crisp morning air of her waking existence, and the end was nowhere in sight.


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing, people!

**A/N: **This one's a tiny bit complicated and moves in and out of Arizona's perspective. That's all I'm saying, I don't wanna spoil your reading fun.

Hope you guys enjoy it, and if you do, take a second to let me know. If you don't, take a second to lemme know. Mistakes? Take a second to lemme know… You get the picture.

**Onward**

* * *

_She was walking briskly through the halls of the Seattle Grace Mercy West,' two hot-hot coffees' in her hands; searching for her 'hot-hot wife!'_

_The hospital staffers were looking at her all weird, but in her usual chipper-glib smiley fashion, 'Dr. Arizona Robbins' chalked it up to a case of the early morning sour grapes. _

_'So? So she looked happy at six in the morning? So what?!' Her mind wandered a little as her vision was both crisp but also obfuscated with the thoughts of who she was carrying the second coffee for. She was smiling so hard, it damn near split her face! 'And, yeah, so she was happy because Callie pulled an all-day-night-day-shift (that's a thing, right?!) and now she got to see her wife who should be here somewhere?'_

_She took a turn and looked over to the different and bifurcating corridors, thinking on which one to take. She was slowly taking note of the barely there hum of some kid's song. 'Huh, when had she walked into the pediatric wing? She wouldn't find her wife here!' _

_Deciding to back track and take the stairs to the ortho floor, she turned around, promptly; blindly crushing the two steaming cups of coffee on to her dreadfully tired looking wife._

_The excruciatingly hot liquid coffee seeping into her scrub top and doctor's coat caused Callie to stagger back, loose her footing and fall graceless on her 'fine behind' (that's what she called it, she could be such an 80's child sometimes)!_

_Arizona was overtaken with laughter and concern at the same time. She bent down and helped up her scalded wife._

_"Hey!" Callie whined "Where's my apology?!"_

_"Awwww… I'm sorry babe!"_

_"That doesn't count, dude! You are still laughing!" Now up, she saw the woman trying to cover her laugh by cupping her hand over her mouth. Her eyes crinkled on the sides, her nose scrunched up all cute like and her whole face flushed red from un-lady-like tiny snort giggles. _

_She couldn't do much, so Callie went to her go-to move - rolling her eyes at the mean but cute woman in front her as she pinched her scrub top in two places and started fanning it in order to cool off a little. _

_Scrimmaging for the now empty Styrofoam cups, the blonde threw them in the nearest bin, whilst her wife continued to cool off the heat and burn of freshly brewed and unceremoniously spilled morning java. _

_"Dude! You spilled coffee on my boobs!" This was clearly the beginning of Callie's outpourings of outrage._

_But she was soon cut short by the blonde – "Yeah well… it hurts me more than it hurts you! I. LOVE. YOUR. BOOBS."- said the woman with a serious, and some would say misplaced fervor. _

_She took Callie's hand and led her to their locker room where the brunette dug into her messy locker and pulled out another scrub top and began to take the coffee-bombed one off. Arizona was too busy checking the woman out to say anything, really, but Callie insisted on talking. "So? How was last night? Did you miss me?"_

_"Ummm…" Drooling. Arizona was drooling… 'Well what was she supposed to do?! Callie was unhooking her freaking bra! A simple black bra, and yeah she was facing away, but the arch of her back and the way her shoulder blades moved…' _

_"Honey… say something!"_

_"Yeah right… it was a good night... a good night, a fine night, it was..."_

_Callie turned now. Her locker wide open behind her, a new bra in her hand, effectively flashing her partner with a sense of mundane-ness and banality that did not suite what was happening. _

_Callie thought to cut the woman off, this was getting them nowhere - "... Good! Yeah, I got that! And?" The brunette arched her eyebrows, smiling wide; eyes full of glee and playfulness._

_"Hmmm?" The blonde question-moaned, her eyes glued to the most gorgeous pair she's ever seen._

_"Your night? The rest of it?!" 'Ugh! This was fun, but now it's bordering on pervy and they were in their work place for God's sake!' Callie started the short task of putting on a new bra._

_"I'm definitely gay!" The blonde chirped and pouted at the same time, annoyed that Callie had resumed getting dressed. But, on the bright-side her heartbeat was settling down near the norm, she could feel the central air conditioning again, and her lady bits had stopped buzzing at her to jump the sexy Orthopod and risk getting caught. _

_"That's good to know babe. But you know I knew right?! Especially when you did that bent like a bow, slick like a snake thing with your tongue… also, we were in bed and doing the no pants wrestle-hustle __and the last I checked…" She stopped and pointed downwards at her now clothed breasts, "I have boobs!"_

_"And the last I checked…" now Callie continued talking whilst walking towards the blonde; a dangerously lusty smirk forming on her lips. "You don't have…" reaching the blonde, she slid her hand over her slender waist and rested it flat against her stomach. She rubbed it over the material of the blonde's scrub top, and then slipped her hand downwards cupping her sex, rubbing it over the material with her palm, the heel of her palm grazing the blonde in the most pleasantest of ways._

_The blonde moaned at the sudden but welcome onslaught of a sexy nature and leaned into kiss the woman in front of her, preferably - into oblivion. Kissing her wife senseless, she backed her into the lockers, holding the open and waving door of Callie's locker for support. She hooked a leg over Callie's, giving her greater access to do with her, to her, as the woman pleased._

_But, right at that instance, a loud ring came from within Callie's locker interrupting their tongue tango. The two stopped, resting their foreheads against one another as they tried to get their breathing under control._

_The ringing continued. Callie freed herself from her lover's embrace, diving into her messy locker and looking for her pager all the while putting on her spare scrub top. _

_"Crap!" She's started walking towards the exit now. "It's a 911 to the pit! I gotta go babe!"_

_"Hey wait! You, me and Sophia?! Dinner tonight, cool?!"_

_Callie looked back at her, stopping momentarily at the exit, a mischievous grin on her face, coupled with a curious expression… "Sophia?" She said in her thinking voice. "Is that the hot new nurse in Cardiothoracics?"_

_"Callie… What are you talking…"_

_Her partner cut her off with loud and open laugh; that inviting, warm kind that made her think of hot chocolate and the dewy grass of early mornings. Callie spoke, glancing again at the pager, now clasped securely to her hip; the ringing becoming louder and more__ insistent_. "Erica…" she sighed the name, looking perfectly calm and serene, all the while oblivious to the sudden pin pricks of an awkward and indefinable fear which took hold of Arizona's stomach.

_"Erica" 'there it was again, that odd feeling, why would Callie'… "You know I'm not into threesomes!" And with that pronouncement and pep in her step grossly inappropriate for someone about to be faced with assessing an emergency trauma case, Callie left the room._

_'Wait, what? What was going on?!'_

_Arizona stumbled back a little, beginning to sweat at the exponentially growing feeling of unease; dread almost. She took a step backwards, only somewhat aware that the shrill ringing of the pager continued to haunt the locker room even after Callie had left with hers._

_Continuing to walk backwards, she took a slight tumble, falling backwards. Her back hit one of the lockers, her right hand up and hitting the door of Callie's locker, forcing it shut._

_She brought the hand up in front of her face, nursing it with a light pressure from the other one, and began to slowly turn around. And, as she turned and stood, facing the locker, she saw in the mirror attached to the locker - the face of a woman she did not recognise. Beautiful, but in a peculiar way, a sallow face with fierce eyes, but it wasn't hers, it was… "Erica" she whispered, touching the reflection in front of her._

_Staring at her was the woman who disappeared on Callie; the woman who, maybe is destined to disappear on Callie._

_The shrill ringing of the pager kept getting louder till it began to hurt her ears._

Arizona quickly covered her ears, arms bent at the elbows, taut and strained, a blaring pain in her temples, as she jerked up in her bed, inadvertently throwing the covers.

She quickly turned her head towards the bedside table, fumbling to pick up the photo frame with the picture of her and Callie on their wedding day. She brought it up to her face, heart racing, palms sweating so bad she was afraid she'd drop the frame. Bringing the frame closer to her face, she squinted in the morning light. The light and faint reflection of the woman staring back at her was still_ her _– Arizona Robbins. Except… she looked so very different from that woman in the photo, so much so that she could no longer tell which one she was… Who she was, if she was in fact anyone… 'Maybe… maybe she really was disappearing?'

'Maybe she should have a long time ago?'


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: **Not mine, never mine.

**A/N: **Again, no notifications… Hmmm… curious. But, no matter, keys just keep on typing. BTW checkout the sneak peeks on gabble. Those gabblers are prompt!

If you haven't checked out the 4th instalment in this series yet, it's a nightmare sequence for Arizona, so give it a once over.

Again, take a sec and let me know what you did or didn't like. I will soon be doing an overall editing of the entire thing; I can see some mistakes but I'm lazy...

**A/N 2.0: **In case it was unclear, single quotes are used for encasing the characters' thoughts and also for sarcastic phrases etc. Also, anyone know if I can set FF to British English, it keeps correcting stuff via US the spellchecker; very, very annoying!

**Onward**

* * *

The paradoxical-slowest-fastest two weeks of their lives were over...well _almost_ two weeks. Dr. Barbie Boswell had flown off on her (probably) bedazzled broom, and the hospital was left with two suspiciously sickeningly overcompensating-ly happy chirpy doctors who intermittently smiled maniacally when they were around other people whilst their eyes found one another, and sometimes the exact opposite would happen and at least Callie would look like she licked a wet cat living in a med-waste dumpster.

Nearly two weeks. They'd been talking some, very little really, scheduling Sophia's comings and goings over the phone, once over coffee, but nothing more than that. Callie for her part found herself waiting on Arizona, yet again, to broach the subject of what was to be done next, but the blonde never did so.

On day twelve, loosing most of patience and her temper Callie had the woman paged, forgoing the absolutely personalised and seemingly more invested route of hunting her wife down and pulling her into an empty room and hashing it out with her.

Arizona, found herself walking towards the Ortho wing of GSM. She'd pretty much been operating on auto pilot for the past week and a half. The only time she felt anything at all, let herself feel anything at all – was when she was with her daughter or was stealing glimpses of her wife flitting around their hospital.

She'd stand, hiding, feeling almost like a _creepy, creepy_ stalker watching Callie smile her big warm-eye twinkling-teeth sparkling-knees weakening smile at some unsuspecting patient; she did that when she earned a medical win or saw that she could do something new and different. Callie smiled like that when she saw that she could do more, be more… 'Callie was always doing that, being more. She just kept at it, always at it. Always generous. It was, _is _so endearing.' It's why she was in love with her. _Maybe_ it was why she thought she could hurt her more and more, push her… it was like a horrible experiment, and she did pretty much feel like a mad scientist right now – trying to breathe life back into this _whole_ made of salvaged bits and pieces of their lives together, their home, their kid…their family.

Callie, never usually one for waiting around, began to walk towards the nurses' station.

Arizona turned the corner blind (lost in her internal monologue) and crashed into the unmistakable softness of her – now ill at ease wife. The two staggered back a little; Arizona's heart kicked into high gear, a dark nervousness blooming in her tight chest; she was suddenly rattled with a sense of deja vous.

Callie was still looking down at herself, massaging her abdomen a little, and as she began to voice her discontent with the crash, and crasher _"DUDE! WATCH WHERE YOU'RE GOING…"_ –she looked up.

"Oh, it's you." That came out decidedly harsher than she'd meant it to. '_Watch it, Torres!__** You**__ paged __**her**__, remember?!_'

"Yeah, I'm… I'm sorry, I wasn't looking, and…" 'Lame! Arizona was being lame and hesitant and that apology was meant for _so many things_ other than a simple bump-'n-bash in the corridors'.

Callie spoke as her anger settled from 'boiling' to 'simmering', "it's fine Arizona…"

"So? You…ummm… you wanted to talk?" '_The gall?!_ Arizona had the gall to sound hopeful'; for whatever reason it was beautiful, but also infuriating to the Orthopod.

"Yeah", there... she was back to that clipped, irritated tone, "I wanted to discuss _us_." 'Ugh! Admitting it felt like she was giving up on the war on terror or something!' "But can we not do it out here…"

They both looked around, and their eyes settled simultaneously on the infamous on call room they were both unwittingly standing in front of. It caused Callie's stomach to churn, whilst Arizona looked at her wife, holding her breath, waiting for something, anything really to smite her down in a biblical manner. Her wife looked about ready to lose her lunch.

The blonde thought it a good time to risk speaking to her wife, "so you want to go someplace else?"

"Ummm…" Callie stopped and took a big gulp of air to assuage the ever present nausea and sudden dizziness that overtook her person for the shortest stretch of time. Steadying herself on the side railing attached to the wall, she spoke, feeling okay to talk again "Yeah… yes, let's just…" she nodded, pointing to the stair well.

They both walked together, Arizona a little behind her; she was concerned Callie might actually fall or something weird like that!

They went down a flight of steps… then two. Then Callie stopped and abruptly turned around - only to have her wife awkwardly and suddenly stop, tensely holding herself back so that they didn't have a second crash.

They both looked around, and as the silence of the empty stairwell enveloped the two women, the two found each-others' eyes. Slow, wide smiles broke out on their faces and took over their tired features. They both were about to say something, but Callie stopped, more interested in watching the blonde smile for the first time in a long, _long _time. Arizona actually bust out in a loud trill, huffing a little trying to catch her breath, she said – "what is this? Play a cosmic joke on the lesbians day?!"

They looked around some more, a second wave of the awkward silence that so often haunted these blank pockets in their recent interactions taking over again. Both of them sobered, their minds resting together on the same fact. This was_ their_ stairwell, where they'd come to steel kisses during a busy work day, and share anything but a sandwich. They'd been like teenagers under the bleachers during a football match. But, it made them smile nonetheless.

'Maybe… maybe it was a sign… that they could do this, be together again, or maybe it was wishful thinking.'

As they both continued going through the motions, Arizona realised she was holding the inside of Callie's doctor's coat, whist Callie had her eyes firmly trained on her wife's lips. She felt Callie trail her hand tenderly over hers and all she wanted to do was lean in and kiss the woman. 'Even if just for a bit; they could be those younger, less jaded versions of themselves.'

But, something broke the spell as Callie looked up from her lips and into her eyes. 'They weren't those people anymore, and they never would be.' Callie's grip on her hand turned from that feather light, electric touch to something firmer as she slowly but respectful pried Arizona's hand off of her person and placed it gently on the railing running along the stairs. Arizona looked at her hand, a little disappointed, "You wanted to…"

"Right, I… wanted to talk to you."

"Okay?"

"I want to know what you're thinking."

"You said two…" Callie quickly cut her off…"Two weeks! I know, but I didn't mean avoid me in the meanwhile and…and be awkward and give me creepy murderer like smiles around other people! I want you to be…"

"_Normal_?!" blind, hot, poisonous anger poured into one word; Arizona could be so unfathomably succinct sometimes!

The blonde heard her question echoing in the stairwell as the woman in front of her looked on. She looked a little terrified and taken aback; a look Arizona had become so accustomed to since after the amputation when she regularly badgered her wife. Another wave of guilt engulfed her and she could feel herself tearing up, but she dared not to look away this time, 'that wasn't fair to Callie. None of this was fair to Callie."

"I just meant that…"

_"What Callie?! What did you mean?!"_ That came out like a desperate plea; one that was answered with silence.

_"I'm sorry"_, Arizona sobbed out the broken apology, looking smaller by the second; yes that was desperation. She was breaking again, but this time it wasn't in the isolation afforded to her inside her desolate and broken home – 'A home _she_ broke! Or maybe… _maybe they broke it?'_ She wasn't close to any answers, but the emptiness of the last few days only taught her that she wanted it all. Not… not because she was scared without it, but because everything was meaningless without _them_ there. Her wife, her kid! It's like she'd somehow unlearned the only language she knew, the one closest to her heart's meanings, desires, and suddenly the script was lost… and the only door was gone, and she was trapped!'

_"Are you?!" _She hated how Callie said that, all weak-like and vulnerable; like a scared lamb who was repeatedly led to be slaughtered, only to be spared for a later date of execution.

"Are you sorry, Arizona?! Because, that's the first time you've said it! And, I've needed to hear it for the past… however many days! How am I supposed to _know _what you're thinking when you don't even bother to say that one basic thing! I _need_ to know what you're thinking; I need to know that you _ARE_ sorry!" She paused for breath, venturing a look at the silent woman who looked at her aghast, as if she was being hit by some profound realisation.

'Maybe she should stop? Arizona was looking a little… something… iffy, prepped for puking? What the heck?! She was already on a roll! She might as well finish!'

"And… and I said two weeks, like… find a house or whatever, not be the brain dead Houdini of social interactions or whatever! You could say hi and…"

"What? I say hi, and you what? Would you talk to me?! Could you manage civility, because I couldn't _stand_ that, Callie? Especially not right now…after what I did, I couldn't…"

She was quickly cut off by her wife – "This isn't all about _you! _What about what _I_ want, Arizona?! When you were getting better or whatever all that was, _because clearly…" _she made a show of pointing all over towards the blonde and continued, "when you were getting better, you asked me not to handle you or cajole you or some shit like that!

"How is what you're doing right now any different! You are so freaking afraid, that you won't even engage. Or… or…"

"Or what, Callie?" coaxed the blonde. 'This would help. It _was _helping, knowing what Callie wanted.' She was beginning to realise that drowning in her own guilt translated pretty quickly into _seemingly_ ignoring her wife, that it would solve nothing for them; that it would _do _nothing for them!

The response was loud and harsh, full of hurt – "Or you don't care enough to engage anymore!"

And there it was! 'She had to say something, _now,_ before they could fall further into the trap of misunderstanding one another.'

"_NO!_ That's not it at all! Don't think that! I would just… God, my heart would just…" 'Christ! She was saying the word _heart! _It was so weird, having to say this to Callie; Callie should have known like Arizona always did… She should know!'

"I want you. I do. And, I want us, but…" – water works – 'so uncool and leaky faucet like all the freaking time!' "…but I'm afraid, that we can't…" She stopped, settling her rocketing heartbeat as it echoed in her ears and her head, dancing behind her eyes.

"What if you can't forgive _this_? What if you look at me like this all the time? _All our lives?!_"

"Stop." Callie took a step forward, very deliberately holding Arizona's hand for comfort; who it was meant to comfort at this juncture was very, _very_ debatable. "You need to stop, Arizona", she whispered.

"You need to stop, and risk it. You'll doubt yourself _and_ us into oblivion! What happens next? It doesn't matter a thimble's worth if you don't forgo the doubt and the fear and risk yourself anyway!" She brought her hand up and brushed lightly at the wisps of hair on the blonde's cheek. Leaning forward she whispered in her ear, her breath heavy and brushing against Arizona's cheek "you can't leave again. You're always trying. Try to just…_ just be with me_, and we'll be angry, loud and loathe each-other, until we don't anymore." Her other hand slid up from where she was holding Arizona's, brushing the length of her arm and it finally settled on her shoulder, squeezing lightly.

She heard Arizona's sharp intake of breath and backed away but only enough to lightly bring her lips to Arizona's; just a feel of each-other, slow but quickly fading, intoxicating.

Arizona hadn't realised when it was that she'd closed her eyes, but when Callie finally leaned away, she opened them, missing the feel of her instantly.

"You feel that?" asked Callie, putting her hand on her wife's chest, the hum of that confused little thing that sent shockwaves and tiny hot explosions everywhere, but still rooted her mind in an ever endearing stillness. 'She was floating, and moving, and falling, and scared, and safe."

"That's me, pulling at you, like no one can. No one can love you like I do, and you don't know it _yet_, or maybe you never did, or maybe…_ just maybe_ you've forgotten, but you can't stop, and you can't switch it off. Loving me, you can't escape it.

"You did something I'll never forget, and maybe I'll never forgive it, but I need to… _we_ need to understand it. Why you did it. And, I'll doubt this" she gave a slight push with the hand for emphasis, "every day for a long, long time, but every time we kiss, or I look at you, _this_ will happen, because it'll be there till you die."

"Callie..." she sighed and blubbered like a fool.

"You can call it ego, you can call it narcissism and you can call it presumptuous. Call it whatever you want Arizona, but… if you can stop" she slid her hand down the length of her torso and deposited it back in the pocket of her doctor's coat; the next words out of the brunette's mouth came out in an angry and desperate rush – "if you think you can stop and feel safe and live without it, if you don't want more than _just safe?_ Then I dare you to stop…"

With that she'd said her fill and started her trek towards the entrance to the main building when her wife stopped her.

"Callie." 'There, she was sighing again; crying again. When would the crying stop, when could she just breathe again?!'

"Callie, I can't. I can't stop! I don't want to stop! And I'm just scared, but I get that so are you… and…and we'll be scared together?" She asked hesitantly as they both turned around to face one another.

"Can you do that with me? Be scared _with_ me?" 'Just be with me.'

The brunette finally, fearfully smiled through tears – "yes" she whispered her consent. "Yes, we'll be scared together…"


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer: **Not mine, any of them. Well, except this new guy. You'll see!

**A/N:** Shoot, I totally had something inspired, inspirational and funny!

Anyway, what is hash-tagging? It sounds violent. I know its twitter related, but I'm not a tweeter. I was speaking to a friend about it and we both don't know. At all. And, I'm too lazy to google it!

But, you don't be lazy. Read and review good people of FF!

**A/N 2.0:** This is definitely shorter, but necessary. I think it's time Callie got a new friend! Enjoy dear readers!

**Onward**

* * *

"Then what did you do?"

Callie point-poked at the man talking to her, her drink sloshed in her glass a little, "the dude was holding a carving tool that looked like a classy shiv! What do you think I… I panicked!" the drink spilled over the rim, falling on her knee – "oh, shoot!"

Jasper looked at her all askance, with a wry smile in place. When the woman looked up, she caught his gaze; she looked around, suddenly feeling awkward and out of place without her wife there. She couldn't take that _look_ anymore.

'_Jeez!_'

She smiled a killer smile, trying desperately to cut through this odd feeling, and rolled her eyes at the man. "What?" she asked, slightly amused and exasperated.

"Why are you looking at me like… well…" she fumbled, a little red faced, her ears hot; embarrassed she was having to address this at all.

_"Like what?"_ he asked in a playful whisper, wagging his thick eyebrows at her; he looked like Mark in a certain light.

"I don't know, like I'm amusing you… or… or_ something_", she finished lamely.

He thoughtfully swirled his glass around a little, hearing the ice clinking in the now shallow drink – "I just think you're adorable…" he said with an almost private and wistful smile. He looked up at her, reading trepidation and something… something else in her eyes, and realised that was the wrong thing to say. "I mean… I mean, you know? That a grown adult says 'shoot!' who says that?!" he said with a manly and deep chuckle.

'This was her out right here, and she'd take it!' "Well, grown women with two year old's at home, I'd imagine!" she said with a tight smile as she began to gather her things and asked the bar keep for her bill.

As she went to look at the bill book, Jasper quickly put his hand over hers – "Hey, Torres, let me get it!"

"What?!" _'Yeah, slippery slope buster!'_ "No, no way, keep your money dude! Friendly drink, remember?" Again, she smiled through the awkwardness of it all.

"_Oh please!_" he guffawed, "don't flatter yourself Torres! It's my first day here, and you explained the lay of the land _and_ helped me babysit the _dumb_ new interns. Newbie duty comes with drinking privileges!"

She looked at him skeptically 'She should look like that all the time, she looked good skeptical or taking a drink of water, damnnit! This woman seemed to do _everything_ in slow motion with _pretty woman _playing the background!

"I don't know Jasper, are you sure? I mean…"

"Hey_. Come on!"_ he cut her off instantly. "Don't over-think it!"

"Yeah, but you don't have to pay" she said hesitantly, giving the bill book a slight yank, but he kept a firm hand over hers, "I was just being courteous" – she said with a smile and a nod.

"Hey!" he protested, putting his hands on his heart, a look of mock hurt on his face, body jerking back, half of him dangling off the bar stool – "why you gotta hurt me like that, Torres!"

'Yeah, so freaking much like Mark!'

"Alright, if you're sure!" she said with a wide and friendly smile.

"Sure, I'm sure!" he took the bill book, opened it taking a look and whistling a fast escalating whistle, drawing up his eye brows in surprise.

"Ugh!" she exclaimed, "what is it now? What other amusing cartoon like thing did I do now?!"

"Heh", he laughed giving her his attention whilst putting down a few bills on to the pay tray inside the bill book. "Nothing really, it's just, you're peculiar…" he trailed off.

She was a little incensed with that comment. "Peculiar?" she rolled the word around on her drunken tongue, thinking if it fit right with her. "When you say peculiar, what do you mean exactly?"

"It's just that…" he waved his hand around in a circular fashion, as if to beckon suitable words out of the air between them "…it's just that. You… ummmm… drank the cheapest wine and the most expensive scotch."

"Hey, I said I'd pay for myself, I'm a doctor! And… and… and I make good money and I can afford it, and so can you! And, who… who… who doesn't like good scotch?!"

'Ranting, she was ranting! And, she was cute when she was ranting!'

"The girls I go out with" he quipped.

Yup, that got her to stop. "I'm sorry, _what?!_" she asked confused and a little bewildered, because she was certain she had been telling him about the different kinds of wood used to preserve cask wine in Florence.

"The girls I go out with" he reiterated, "they don't _get_ _why good scotch_! _You know?!"_

'She did know!"

"Because" she said, "good scotch is like – "smooth jazz for the soul!?" – They laughed the last word out, saying it together with surprised, but understanding and excited smiles on their faces.

Callie was beginning to get up, feeling oddly disappointed at leaving one Dr. Jasper Callahan to his lonesome when he swiveled his stool to face her as she continued to stuff her purse while she stood.

"Hey Callie?"

"Hmmm?" She asked still looking at the task at hand, now wrapping her scarf around her neck.

The next question surprised them both. It was asked with a vulnerable tenderness you wouldn't expect from a 6ft 2" mammoth of a QB type, but he asked it anyway – "stay for another?"

She hesitantly looked up at him, his eyes were fixed on hers, but she saw him drawing nervous meaningless patterns in the ice water on the bar.

In that instance, he reminded her of Mark yet again.

She looked down at her watch to check the time, smiling slowly to herself and proceeding to grace him with that same smile – "as long as you're paying!" she said mirthfully, throwing her weight on to the bar stool again.

His face lit up with a slow smile, "no way, you moocher!" he laughed as his bumped their shoulders together and ordered them another scotch.

* * *

**A/N 3.0: **Don't hate, keep the faith!


	7. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer: **Not mine, any of them. Well, Dr. J. C is.

**A/N: **Right now I plan on making everything better, eventually. At least that's how it's mapped out in my head. But, I will admit, I do like to watch them making asses of themselves, so it will not be so very simple.

**A/N 2.0: **Again, thoughts, sarcasm, new(ish) phrases and garbled Calliesque word jumbles are in single quotations.

**Read, Enjoy and take a moment to Review people! Reviews keep me typing. They are finger fuel. **

**_*Ewww... i just grossed myself out, "finger fuel?! Really?*_**

**The following P. S. has a few spoilers regarding the finale, but the chapter I'm posting does not.**

**I repeat there are NO finale spoilers in this chapter! **

**P. S.** – I have no words for the finale, save that it was expected! How cool is Baby Bailey?! Almost as cool as Lady Bailey! And, how cool was Derrick's hair under duress?! Cooler than him…

**Onward**

* * *

Callie walked fast, rushing to get to Arizona's at a half-way decent time and a reasonable grace period when it came to being late. 'She wasn't _that_ late! She was a _little _late! Half an hour! _That's it!_' She hurriedly looked down at her watch – 'times two! Fudge! What?! She was _thinking _fake swear words too now?!'

Her internal monologue caused her to smile a small wistful smile as she now stood at Arizona's door. She was thinking about her night with Jasper when two twerp-y children ran down the corridor making a loud freaking ratchet. Arizona came busting out the front door shouting a loud "oye!" when her faced bumped into Callie's.

_"Ahhh! Gosh Darnnit, Arizona!"_ she cried while rubbing her nose.

"I'm beginning to think you're subconsciously taking out your latent anger on me by" she comically air quoted her next words _"'accidentally'"_ – yup she was talking slowly now, probably to insult the blonde's intelligence - "running into me, again and again. _Hard._"

Arizona rolled her eyes at her, but had decency to apologise.

"You gonna let me in?"

"Oh! Yeah! 'm sorry…" she stepped aside and waved her in… "come in, come in!" – she huffed the invitation out in a small nervous chuckle.

Callie looked around, "the place looks…"

There was a princess themed room she could see through a door that was slightly ajar. Outside, in the living room was a horrendous looking couch with a _'what was that?! After-birth?! It'd smelled like after-birth when she'd come to look at the apartment the first time_'. The living room was _huge_, 'big enough, she knew, for her wife to sulk and skulk in.' There was the other bedroom, closed – Arizona's of course, and off to the side, adjoining the open breakfast bar was the balcony. Some steps led upstairs to a large studio like room with glass walls.

Arizona had wanted the upstairs space as an office. It was the only place in the apartment that had new furniture, except for Sophia's room where nothing was or ever would be left wanting. Upstairs, right where the banisters ended, she could see a row of potted plants and _that_ was all the decoration Arizona did.

In the living room downstairs there was a tiny television set in front of the oh-so-ugly after birth couch. The television unit had pictures of Tim, one of Sophia with Barbra and the Colonel, but other than that, there were no pictures of the three of them together. _'Huh!' _

"Callie? Hey? You were saying something?" enquired the somewhat nervous woman. She could hear Arizona nervously shift her weight from one foot to the other repeatedly; something she did when she felt like she was under pressure or scrutiny. Callie wasn't going to let her wife hang in the weird _'crap! does-she-not-like-my-apartment-anymore-limbo' _any longer.

"It _looks? _Yeah, no Arizona, the couch… you need to throw that out, put a rug on it? Burn it? Donate it to Santan worshippers! Something!" The blonde laughed a small laugh of relief, talking over her wife's many, many suggestions – "_Yes, yes, okay, I get it! Kill the couch and dispose the body!"_

'This was nice… right? They were bantering like their old selves?' But when Arizona looked at the couch again she realised _just_ how unlike old times it was. 'She was in her own apartment for God's sake! Living apart from her wife! Having to schedule when she'd meet her kid! _This was so messed up…they were so messed up!_'

"Hello my little crack baby! Hi my baby boo! Oh! Look at you! Look at you!" Callie cooing at Sophia, picking her up, taking in her baby smell with that loud obnoxious sniffing noise that drove her up the wall! It made her heart 'a gooey' pulpy warm mulch-y mess. _'Ekh! That was a gross thought; she used to be so cool once. Now? Now she was a… a… a MOM!'_

"Don't call her crack baby!" she chided the woman holding the baby shaped gun that zapped everyone into fits of cuddles and snuggles.

Callie looked up, the smile on her face toning down in its intensity.

"So? You asked me here. What's up?"

"Yes…" She was beginning to breakdown in a nervous sweat. _'How attractive?!'_, she thought to herself. Then it occurred to her to ask, hedging the question in as polite and non-accusatory a manner as she could bring herself to – "I asked you here at eight, it's a quarter past nine, your shift ended at six, so…"

"Oh! Here we go!" Callie hissed, putting Sophia down in the play pen and turning back towards her wife. The blonde looked kind of taken aback at the animosity and quiet ferociousness with which Callie had spoken to her. She put her hands up in half placation, half supplication – all surrender – "hey…hey I was just asking. It's okay if you don't want to share. I just…"

"You just what?! Thought I was out partying it up with some floo…" she reconsidered her choice of words, remembering the tiny-tiny ears in the room with them - "not nice girl?"

_"No!"_ - A fast, prompt protest from the other woman. "I just thought maybe you had an interesting case you'd like to talk about. I just… I asked… just to talk." – _'just to hear your voice more, share your life more.' _

There it was again. One of those intermittent, palpable moments of desperation that got away from Arizona once in a while. Callie felt guilty at the thought of wanting that to happen more; hoping for these raw moments where she could see her wife in pure, unadulterated agony and want – guilt over what she did, what she cost them. She felt terrible, but she also felt reassured that Arizona was invested in them.

"No, I… there was no interesting surgery. I don't feel like chasing interesting surgeries anymore…"

"Callie…"

"Stop with the… the…"

"What?" _'just say what you want me to do and I'll do it! Anything!'_

"Sighing my name like that! Breathing it out all low and moany-like!"

Arizona smiled. She was smiling. Callie chose to ignore _that_, because _that _was a minefield of crazy angry thoughts that'd derail this entire evening… whatever this entire evening was.

"To answer your question," huffed the brunette – "I was at Joes. I needed a break so I went with a… a" – she smiled when she said it – "a friend."

"Oh?"

'Was it just her or did Arizona sound all _fake happy-real worried-totally interested?_'

"Who?"

"Ummm…" 'Callie was looking at her weird – "the new guy, a Dr. Jasper Callahan, trauma? You know? After Kepner and the bus thing…"

"Yeah… yeah. Yes, Christina was saying they'd hire someone new… I just voted for whomever Bailey recommended." She said with a shrug of her shoulders. Both of them were clear on not really wanting to talk about Kepner and all that death business.

They didn't talk about it much after it happened. Another doctor dead – April Kepner's well-meaning heroics during the storm just went to show that they lived in a untiringly unfair world where no good deed went unpunished. Since then, Avery had requested a leave of absence and was still on leave, nearly a month…well twenty-four days after the incident.

Bailey had inherited Dr. Webber's stake in the hospital and with it a chair on the board, the voting privileges and administrative pain in the _bootock_ that came with it all.

When the topic of the need to appoint a new trauma surgeon had surfaced, they'd all dumped the load on Bailey as a rite of passage, citing it as an incitation of sorts; they really just wanted to lump it on the new guy! Bailey had reluctantly risen to the occasion, but it soon became painfully evident that the brilliant general surgeon was also a power house administrator. Right now, with the tiniest stake in the hospital, that little dynamo was basically manning the entire ship.

"_Right_, so he came in today and we had a few cases together – a construction site debacle!" 'Yup, alright so her wife sounded inappropriately _excited_.' It reminded her of the **_Boner for Broken Bones_**t-shirt she'd printed for Callie early on, when they were still courting one another.

"So", Callie continued – "I showed him around while we dealt! He hated the interns; I hate the interns, so we went for a friendly drink!" The last bit came out like a challenge.

"Anyway, I'm confused Arizona_. You _should know. Christina said the board talked 'bout it." Surprisingly enough, Callie didn't sound bitter about not being on the board anymore. She'd signed over her stake to Arizona and even though she wasn't chasing surgeries and such like, she was more involved in the medicine and her research, and that went a long way in keeping her… _well_… sane; _happy_ would be a bit of a stretch at this point.

"I haven't really been attending those…"

"Why the hell not?!"

"It feels weird… being there when… when you… without you, it feels _wrong!_"

"Arizona," it came out like a prayer. "Come on! We've talked about this! It's… I've asked for so little!"

"I know, okay? I…"

They heard a faint gurgle in the background. Sophia looked bored and done with the kiddies program; Dora was playing in Spanish and 'so she's found something in a tree on a mountain again! _So what?!'_

Arizona got up, "I'll put her to sleep and we'll _talk. _There's some red in the cabinet under the stove…"

"You keep alcohol under the fire where you burn your food!" 'Livid. Callie was livid.' Her mother's shriek jolted the toddler and scared her into crying.

"_Great job! _Now it'll take that much longer to get her to calm down!" Arizona matched her wife in anger and intensity, though she chose not to be quite _so_ loud. "And I it keep it there so it's easier to reach and I'll…" 'Callie was giving her _a look._' Just then she realised what she sounded like…"and I'll move it" – she finished lamely, all the fight leaving her body.

* * *

Twenty five minutes, two bed-time stories and a lot of humming and bum-patting later the two women found themselves enveloped in a calm silence. This time it wasn't awkward though. It was clear that the two of them were re-grouping in order to _talk _like rational adults.

Arizona, perched on the couch went to top up Callie's wine glass, but the Latina quickly covered her glass with her hand. It was getting late and she _had to_ go home tonight so she thought it prudent to stop – before she got two far ahead of herself.

Callie had flat out refused to sit on the couch; intermittently eyeing the thing like it was her arch nemesis. She chose to sit on a rug on the floor instead.

"You know?" Arizona started – "this would go a lot easier if you'd have some more wine."

"_Really?!_ That's your sage advice?!" She went on to speak in her best Arizona impression, bobbing her head for further approximation to the real deal, batting her eyelashes because she knew it'd get Arizona's goat – _"Oh Callie!"_ – That was disturbingly close, but just a little too sing-song-y – "_Let's do this tipsy!"_

Arizona shrugged her shoulders – "I'm no sage. I thought we'd established as much!"

"Sooo… Jasper? He sounds nice…" Arizona droned, nose deep in her half empty wine glass. She heard a stirring and looked up from her glass. Callie had slung her bag onto her shoulder and was fishing her phone out of it; presumably to call a cab.

"What are you doing?!" – her voice was small and a little surprised at Callie's abrupt attempt at an exit.

"What does it look like, _Arizona?_" she huffed, exasperated and at the end of her rope. "Look I came here because you had something important to say! That's what you said on the phone! And, I'm sorry I was late, but we had a civil dinner and we did the _family_ _time_ thing with Sophia."

Arizona looked about ready to jump at that 'family time' comment, but the incensed brunette never gave her a chance.

"_No matter_, however short it was. And, I've waited patiently for you to open up, and now you're what? What are you… interrogating… insinuating?!"

"Woah! Calm down, I didn't say anything!" the blonde exclaimed. "I just wanted to know how your evening was!"

"Stop it! Just… just stop gas-lighting* me! Okay? I'm not an idiot!"

Arizona for her part began to look both shocked and guilty, which Callie found… _a relief_.

"You keep circling back to Dr. Callahan! In that… in that… _tone! _I don't know _what_ it is about the way you're asking about him, but it's been a long day and it's rubbing me wrong." She'd started dialing the cab company and walking towards the door. "So you stop that now! I'm allowed to have friends, and I'm sorry if I'm not sulking over you and getting depressed enough to your satifac…"

"Hey! Wait a minute!" Arizona cut her off. "I don't want you depressed! How can you _say _something like that?! I'm not _trying_ to spread misery!"

_"Well, you could've fooled me!"_

**_Silence. _**

They were breathing hard and very, very thankful for the fact that Sophia hadn't woken up because with all the loud bickering the entire apartment building must have; Sophia slept like her Ma, tiny snores and oblivious till daylight.

Arizona took a deep breath and hazarded breaking the silence – "I've begun therapy."

It was a simple statement or maybe it was a shy admission.

"Oh."

"I'm trying, Callie."

"I know. I know you are."

"Good. I needed you to know. You should know that… that I'm trying." _'God why was this so freaking hard?!'_

"Okay", she said whilst re-positioning her bag on her shoulder, irritated with the fact that it kept slipping off every two seconds.

"I should still go. It's getting late." Every word was quieter than its antecedent. She pulled her phone out again to request the services of a cab company.

When Arizona realised Callie had been put on hold by the good people at _'Abraa-__**Cab**__-Daabraa!'_ she ventured to ask Callie a question.

"Callie?"

The brunette looked up. She was biting her lip, listening to the god awful hold music – "Hmmm?" she asked.

Arizona asked her next question with an anxious vulnerability – "will you wait up here till the cab comes? We could watch the after-hours infomercial together or whatever? You could pick something if… if that's lame."

Callie looked at her, thinking it over. She was about to speak, but then she put her hand up and talked into the phone. "Yeah, anhaan. Yes, thirty minutes suits me just fine. Thanks!" She stopped to cancel the call.

"Callie?" – Arizona looked at her; hopeful.

A hybrid of a sad and happy smile began to overtake her features as Callie whispered a tired and content "yes."

* * *

* **Gas-lighting****:**

(a) To tell a bald faced lie to someone and then brazenly deny that this was ever done.

(b).To tell a lie (consciously or unconsciously) without regard for whether or not you undermine another person's sanity/ perception of reality.

The above definitions are taken from urbandictionary dot com

Gas-lighting is a real psycho-social issue that is rampant, especially in societies with patriarchal accents to them. In fact, it is one of the more subtle tools in the now more sophisticated arsenal of patriarchal dominance. On a simplistic level it can be overcome with truthful, respectful, open and honest communication (in this case) between partners to engender that kind of happiness that comes from true, hard fought and often hard won equality in any relationship.

* * *

A/N 3.0: Alright! Longest chapter yet! I have a real problem with writing longer chapters. But I think 'm getting the hang of it.


	8. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer: **Not mine, any of them. Well, Dr. J. C is.

**A/N: **I hope you guys didn't mind that I killed off Kepner. I was a little weary of doing that, but, it's just that whilst I do not hate the character and Sarah Drew _Midas-es_ (yes, I've decided to use it as a verb, roll with it!) the heck out of it, I find I'm still indifferent to her issues and plights. Maybe a slightly more secular story-line would have been I don't know, _fun_?

I have nothing against religiosity, but when it gets in the way of the basic human stuff – friendship, sex, love… having to endure two seasons of that debate on and off, stretched like a taffy, tasting like burnt rubber?! It's just really off-putting!

And I killed of Richard because I wanted Bailey to be more powerful, muhahahaha!

_About this chapter - _I feel like its dry and the more than a little lifeless. I think I need to figure out, more than anything, how to write exchanges between like a large number of people? Anyway, let me know if you feel it too, that 'something is off' sort of feeling, and if you have ideas on how to change that? Then please share!

**A/N 2.0: **Again, thoughts, sarcasm, new(ish) phrases and garbled Calliesque word jumbles are in single quotations.

**Read, Enjoy, Review! Throw this monkey a peanut!**

**Onward**

* * *

Arizona was walking the corridors of GSM; slowly and tiredly making her way towards the doctor's lounge. During one of their more meaningless meetings, they'd all given up on being frugal and in a moment of collective madness decided that it was a good idea to buy new coffee machines for some of the staff lounges.

Thus began the great coffee war of 2013 that had interns, surgeons, and nurses all clandestinely flitting in and out of those lounges that housed the new machines. If you really thought about it, the fact that the new interns weren't coming out of on call rooms with guilty looks on their faces and reserved said guilt for prohibited coffee runs – may be they weren't that doomed after all.

Arizona huffed a little when in the distance she could make out two interns, '_wait, wait_ _– Karev's interns_. That girl with the boy's name, and that boy with a F.R.I.E.N.D.S' name!' She decided (whilst humming the tune to F.R.I.E.N.D.S) not to do anything about it and just tell Karev instead. He always looked happier when he was yelling at them anyway. She just needed the coffee, _that coffee_, to wind down and then wind up for the next couple of hours.

The smile was slowly stripped from her face as thoughts of Callie clouded her mind. Her wife had stopped using this particular lounge which was a bit of a hot spot for the Seattle Grace Seven when they'd all informally meet and chat with one another, table issues, and plan dinners. As odd as it felt to be in the board room without Callie, this somehow felt worse.

Between the two of them, the hospital seemed to have been divided and organised into hot and cold zones, and whilst Arizona was now _dying_ to see Callie, and didn't care how pathetic she was being about it; 40 days after the storm Callie's initial reaction – undeniable, irrepressible anger, that battled with love and was finally laced with concern – had come to fruition – and suddenly a pinching sort of rage became the constant reading on her barometer.

Callie, seeing how unfair it was to subject Arizona to this new all-consuming fire that constantly beat behind her eyes, clearly, concisely, and with an oxymoronic abrasive politeness told her wife that she was going to keep her distance for a while.

In the meanwhile, in the hospital people had finally started to see how strained things were between them. But, they were not made privy to the extent of the damage that their marriage had incurred.

A fact that was about to change.

As she walked into the lounge, still absent minded-ly humming the chorus, all she hoped for was a bit of quiet. She mindlessly walked to the coffee machine, picking up a cup when –

"Hey" the straight laced voice of Christina Yang made her jump and comically drop the empty cup. She turned around, all accusations.

"Jesus! _Yang!_ You scared the crap out of me!"

"Hey, hey… _Calm down_." Christina pushed off a little from the couch she'd been snugly sitting in. She hunched over and looked at Arizona with a serene and calm smile.

_ 'What the hell!?'_

"Why do you look like the cat that got the canary?" _'…and then brutally murdered it, and psychotically wrote a novel about that murder and made millions…'_

The creepy serene calm _yoda_ face continued to grace the room.

"It's all _okay_ Arizona… we're just going to…"

_"Chistina!"_ came the gasp like call of Meredith Grey. Arizona jumped _again_ for good measure and put her hand on her heart, whilst turning back to see the new intruders.

Meredith was soon joined by Derek, and Bailey. Arizona bent a little to her right to see if Avery was to follow them in. "Is there…ummm…" _'nervous. Why was she feeling so nervous?!'_ "…like a meeting or something and I missed the memo?"

"Come sit next to me" said Christina while she partook in some _creepy, creepy_ smiley, and very weird and awkwardly slow-fake-serene sofa patting.

_"Christina!"_ exclaimed Bailey, "you're scaring the poor woman!"

"She's not a poor woman!" Yang was looking at Arizona directly now. 'Damn! Could she ask her to go back to being creepy? This new expression, whatever it was, was even _more_ unsettling.' "Are you, Robbins?" 'Yup, she's made the shift from 'Arizona' to 'Robbins', she was about to be in some weird intervention type group mauling.'

Arizona decided to go on the defensive, "what do you mean _Yang?_" She said it whilst she narrowed her eyes and she said it like she meant business.

"Just _that. _You _aren't _a poor woman! Why did Callie sign her piece of the pie over to you tuts?!"

_"Chritina!_ Try not to enjoy this so freaking much!"

"Mer, _come on!_ There was a noir marathon yesterday!"

Bailey was busy watching Arizona get paler and paler, and decided to put an end to the all the bush beating – "Hey! Tweedle dee? Tweedle dumb? How about we…you know? Get back to the issue at hand?! Here…" she led Arizona to the single-seater, not missing how Yang's face fell a little.

"Shepherd, get the woman some coffee."

The room went silent for a bit as they all shuffled in and got comfortable. Over the last few months and numerous meetings, this group of people had got a rhythm down. They'd all always gotten along fine in their ORs and work related strategy meetings. But, then something huge happened to them, and through that tragedy they found that they'd all lucked into owning this place together, running this place together. Whether it was good luck or bad was still something all of them were yet to agree on.

They waited till Arizona took a sip from her coffee cup and then as she looked up, she saw four faces silently and simultaneously drawing breath; the inquisition was about to commence.

She had to take control before this became the office of Dr. Doolittle. She put her hand out, palm up towards them, "One person at a time, one question at a time, and before you start?!" She glared at them threateningly – "What's between me and Callie?" her tone was getting increasingly and incredibly clipped, which caused Meredith to grimace and Yang to scoff, whilst Derek and Bailey looked on, interested. "_Is_ between me and Callie!"

"Alright!" Derek said, making a show of truce by clapping his hands together and rubbing them. "I can see you won't answer any questions. So? Bailey? Christina? Mother of my children?!"

But he was cut short…"ugh! Derek don't be so _peppy_!" Christina made a show of fake projectile vomiting.

"Ladies, let's just go! Okay?! It's none of our business!"

"Yeah!" Arizona chimed in "not everyone has a three-way marriage like you guys!" 'Why was she picking a fight?! Derek would've gotten them all outside the door and back to work! She'd be fine, Callie'd be fine!'

"Hey! Not too long ago your baby had two moms and a dad; you wanna talk three-way marriages?! Just go back a year!" _'Freaking Yang!'_

"I would _love _to go back a year!"

Bailey broke it up, "hey!" she pointed at Yang "take a seat and shut your face, or so help me…"

"Fine, whatever, I have surgery anyway!" Yang went for a prompt exit… but stopped, abruptly turned back at them – "no, you know what?!" She honest to God chuckled some. "You did something Arizona, I don't know _what_, but we're going to find out anyway! Eventually, everything here hangs on the wind! But, _whatever _it was, Callie should be _here!_ We did this because of her! She came in all a-pleading, bright-eyed and what not and swindled us all into dreaming big! _Bigger!_ And this may be personal, and I don't really _care_ what happened, but she should… she should be here…" She finished lamely, looking down and scuffing her shoe when her pager went off. She started off at a ridiculous speed but they'd already heard an "oh, thank God!" whispered into the wind.

The room was silent.

"Christina Yang just professed her eternal love for Torres." Derek smirked.

Arizona looked back at him, a little shocked, but with a slight and sad smile on her face – "You know Derek, most days, I miss Mark. Not a lot, because that wasn't our thing, but then of late you seem to make me miss him less… That was totally a Mark thing to say."

The flabbergasted look on Derek face was just about to become a real source of unbridled joy for Arizona when Meredith spoke up from the couch.

"You know she's about to be awarded a grant right?"

Arizona looked on, a little confused, "who, Yang?"

"No, Callie."

"What are you talking about?!"

"You didn't know?!"

Seeing how lost and nauseated Arizona looked, Bailey decided to take over the conversation – "It's true."

"When? When did she…"

"Maybe a week ago? She's gotten in touch with a lot of people after TED. Her work's incredible! You know that!"

_"Of course I know!" _Arizona bit back. "What do they… what is…"

Just then Dr. Callahan burst through the door at a full sprint – "Dr. Robbins?! Trauma bay four! I need you, stat!" And with as little ceremony as his entry saw, so he exited without a second word.

Arizona looked at all of them – "this isn't over, Bai…"

The short woman cut her off "I think we've said too much already. Arizona, talk to your wife," she said those last words in a meaningful whisper, and with a nod, she walked out.

Arizona's eyes followed her out, then she looked back up at Shepherd and Grey.

"You should go." Shepherd spoke up.

"I'm sorry, Ari…"

"Save it Grey!" the blonde's bark cut her off as she briskly started out towards the trauma bays, her mind far from all things medical.

* * *

On reaching Trauma bay four, Arizona found that she was irate with the sight she was met with. When she pulled the curtain she saw her wife and Dr. Callahan sitting on the bed, smiling and chatting away to glory.

"Oh, Dr. Robbins" he greeted her with a smile. _'What was he waiting for?! A hi back!'_

Callahan read the room, becoming painfully aware of the awkward air around them. Not one to stick around in tense situations, especially when he wasn't really party to it, he thought it prudent to leave.

"Callie?" he looked at her with a sympathetic smile, he knew what was coming…well at least that it wasn't going to be good… "I'll meet you later, we have to go over the Farello case?"

"Yeah, sure." She said. Throwing a "thanks again!" at the back of his head as he left.

"You two looked cosy!" Arizona said it in that acerbically saccharine sweet manner that made Callie want to claw at her own eyes.

"Not this again!" Callie said, as she exasperatedly jumped off the bed.

"What am I doing in the trauma bay without a trauma to work on?! _Is this some new form of torture or punishment?!"_ All the screaming was making Arizona's veins pop.

Callie looked on, slack jawed, and unsure of what was going on or what to say.

"Oh come on Callie! I cheat on you and so you find the next hunky Mark-impostor and make me watch while you chat him up and smile around him?! While you have_ all_ your happy moments with him and tell me about them later in the tense silence of my _separate apartment?!_

"Did you… are you… Did you sleep with him Callie?!"

Callie lost her breath – "what?"

"Answer me!" It was loud, jaded, and it was painful.

Callie's eyes were red rimmed from holding in her tears. 'Arizona did not deserve her crying over her right now.'

"_You_ cheated…" Callie hissed – "you cheated and so now you see cheating everywhere!" She began walking towards her wife, almost threateningly.

"And there's no trauma here"- she pushed the blonde in the chest…a light push whilst taking a step forward herself as they both got nearer to the closed curtain – "because I've lived with Christina Yang, and she was asking me _things_, and I know when she's _trying_ to be subtle." Another push, another collective step towards the curtain. "And, I was with Jasper because he's my _friend_" she made sure to loudly emphasis the word, "and he agreed to go rescue you, no questions asked _by the way_, from what I thought would be the camp fire where they'd roast the pig!"

She couldn't hold it in any longer, Callie quickly wiped at her face and gave Arizona a final shove as they both tumbled out of the curtained safety of the trauma bay – "because that's what you are Arizona!"

Now loud and resounding – _"A lying, cheating pig!" _

And, as the two broke eye contact and looked up and around them, they saw their friends, their colleagues and their students; some had their mouths open, some had their hand covering their mouths, eyes wide, everyone - looking at them.

Callie took in the scene, whilst Arizona had eyes only for Callie. She saw her lower lip tremble now, her body was rigid, and she knew what came next. She stood there rooted to her spot as Callie began sobbing, her hands covering her mouth, her eyes pinched closed, and then her brave and gorgeous and generous wife ran, ducking for cover and dignity, away from the prying and spying eyes of the people closest to them.

_She wanted to follow Callie but she realised that she'd just stripped Callie bare and left her naked in front of everyone. Callie wasn't running from__** them**__ anymore, she was running from__** her**__._


	9. Chapter 9

**Disclaimer: **Not mine, any of them. Well, Dr. J. C is.

**A/N: **Alright, so close updates. But, this had been clawing at me to get out, so… Here it is. I know many writers have done a similar thing, and done it well, but I wanted to do my own version of it.

**A/N 2.0: **Again, thoughts, sarcasm, new(ish) phrases and garbled Calliesque word jumbles are in single quotations.

**_Remember_**** - Paully : Cracker :: Author : Reviews.**

Also, I'm going to take a moment and thank all of you who reviewed and followed the story. I think I have 60 follows now! Totally exciting! Thanks, and I usually write back to the reviewers, but still, you guys are awesome!

**Onward**

* * *

"I thought you were… _you know?_ _Catholic?!_"

"_I am!_" Callie looked at him, one challenging eyebrow up and arched.

" _And_… you're also _kindda _gay, _most_ of the times." He said with a shake of his head as if he'd just come across some new information – "_…and _married to a woman _and_ have a baby out of wedlock!"

**_"Woah!"_** Callie went for mock surprise; 'that seemed appropriate'. _"It's like you've known me for a while! How are you doing this?!" _Her words dripping with sarcasm.

"_Okay, okay! _Whatever, Torres! Don't be a pussy!"

"Ewww! Don't talk like that! _What is wrong with you?!_ We're in a…" she stage whispered it, making him break into a smile… "_cemetery_. Surrounded by crosses and statues of saints! Don't say…" she mouthed the word whilst crossing herself – *pussy!*

"So? There you go! You're spiritual! So go be all spiritual and mysterious like… Go, get!" He shoved her shoulder, making her inadvertently take a leap forward.

She took the shove in good humour, letting it propel her towards the goal of the day. She looked at the tomb stone and took a deep breath, wriggling her hands together.

"Mark, I…" soon as she started she was cut off by boisterously masculine laughter. She turned back sharp as a whip and staggered a little, putting her hands out and correcting her balance.

"Hey!" she was pissed off, even more so as Jasper continued laughing, now doubled over, clutching his stomach. "Hey!_ You_ told me to talk to him!"

Jasper straightened up, holding his sides, huffing – "I didn't know you were going to actually do it!"

"Mark, I…" he said it in his best Callie voice while he put his hands on the sides of his cheeks, making a face like the guy from Munch's _Scream_.

"_Shut up! You asshole!" _she said, her anger fast disappearing, giving way to a bright, teary-eyed smile.

He stopped and cautiously walked up to her. _'Huh', _she laughed to herself, 'he looks like he's about to defuse a bomb or something!'

"Callie…" he sighed. He was just a foot away from her now. He brought his hand up to her face, but awkwardly reconsidered it as he saw her eyes tracking his every move. He went with lightly putting his hand on her arm – friendly, supportive, and not too intimate. Just right. _'Just what she needs right_ _now_', he thought to himself.

"Don't cry. _Okay?_ I'm sorry. I was _just…_I wasn't thinking!" he nodded at her, waiting for her to meet his gaze. She looked up at him, eyes red, small tear tracks on her face, but she was smiling. _'So freaking peculiar, this woman!'_

"You finish up", he took a step back from her, missing the feel of her the second he pulled his hand away; he'd held it up, fisted in the air, just for a moment, aching to touch her again… "I'll wait back there" – he gestured at the car-park, vigorously pointing with his thumb, back and over his shoulder.

Her smile widened – _"like I could now!"_-she said whilst _'cutely' _wiping her nose on her cuff and sniffling some.

"Come on Torres, you could try! I won't make fun, okay?" He rolled his eyes. "I'll stand back there and you can… you can pretend that you're… _I don't know?!_ Leaving a message on his answering machine or something!?

"Sounds good? Yeah?" He asked her, fake wide placating smile on his face – vigorous and inquisitive head nodding.

She moved her head side to side signalling a no, but then a short laugh bubbled up her throat as she went ahead and wiped her eyes.

"Can we just leave?" she asked tiredly, expelling a huge breath.

"Sure! Come here!" he said as he put an arm around her. She put her head on his shoulder, taking the comfort he was offering her. As he started leading her back towards where they were parked, he saw her look back at Mark's grave with a small, barely there look of longing. But, he also saw her cover it up just as quickly.

"Oh for Peat's sake!" He smiled at her exasperated, as he brought both of them to an abrupt stop, agilely jumping back a little. To Callie's astonishment, he's started jogging back towards Mark's grave.

"What are you doing?!" she asked after him, bewildered – her voice carrying bold and loud - all over the cemetery. She looked on as he stopped and bent down, yanking some wild flowers from the ground and rushed the rest of the way, and laid them gently on Mark's tomb stone.

He ran back to her in a huff, shielding his eyes from the now bright afternoon sun; as he took his hand off from over his eyes he was greeted with another wide watery smile. _'It felt right – to see her smile, it felt… right, she felt right.'_

He put his arm around her again, "better?"

She laughed it out, wiping at her cheeks again, whist she burrowed deeper into his half hug – "yeah!"

"Hey Callie?"

"Hmmm?"

_"Father and friend?!"_ he asked incredulously.

"It wasn't _me!_" She only got a short laugh in return. It made her smile. _'Jasper just made things easy. She missed this, easy, simple. She had that once.'_

"_Hey Callie?_" He asked again with a mirthful lilt, his voice a little too sing-song-y for her comfort.

She took a deep breath in, enjoying the peace of the cemetery, the bright and unlikely Seattle day, and the unconditional support of a friend, all the while suspicious of his next question – _"hmmm?"_

"You know you swore at the cemetery right?"

She looked up at him, confused and amused – "No, I didn't! What are you talking about?!"

"Ummm… yeah! You did! You called me an assho…" she pushed him away and started power walking towards their ride – "Jasper, you are such a jerk!" – She shouted it back at him with playful anger, her smile hidden from him.

He started walking faster, trying to catch up – "_Oh come on Torres_… Don't be like that_! Torres, hey! Hey! You know I drove you here right?_"

Not a peep from the brisk brunette.

"I'll buy you a drink at Joes?!" He asked her, hopeful; a little worried she might actually be angry as he tried to catch up with her.

* * *

**A/N 3.0: **Short, really short I know, but I thought this kind of a grave-site scene needed to be short and light, otherwise the sheer and possible heaviness of the situation would've gotten away from me in my writing, and then it would be sloppy and overtly angst-y. And, I didn't want to bore you guys with something like that!


	10. Chapter 10

**Something went awry with posting chapter 10, so I had to delete and post it again. Sorry for the inconvenience. **

**Disclaimer: **Not mine, any of them. Well, Dr. J. C is.

**A/N:**

I felt a little bad about announcing the hiatus without also leaving you guys with a chapter too, so here's an update; had it written out so might as well. It'll have to be the last update for a while. I'll be back again after a week-long break.

Again, thoughts, sarcasm, new(ish) phrases and garbled Calliesque word jumbles are in single quotations.

And for those of you keeping track, it's been 47 days since and storm and the confession. And, I am kind of a little tired of writing only angst-y stuff, so this chapter will be mixed. There might be a bit of contrived and forced drama. But, if it's not in real life, then isn't all drama forced and contrived?!

**_Review the Fic, Feed the Author._**

**Onward**

* * *

They hadn't spoken in a week. They saw one another when Sophia changed hands, but beyond that, they only spoke when their jobs demanded it.

Callie felt humiliated. Five years, and she'd been learning and re-learning the meaning of happiness through a torrid affair that transformed into companionable stability with a light-hearted and steadfast partner. She had had a child, gone through another marriage and now she was back to where George had once left her.

But, she wasn't exactly the same person either. She was a 'kick-ass' surgeon, she was pioneering research that people in her profession only dreamed of, and she had Sophia. The love she had for her kid was unchanging, it was constant, and _maybe_ Arizona and she weren't the forever kind of love she had thought they were, but Sophia was unerringly, unmistakably _the_ love of her life.

And as of Friday evening, Callie also had a shiner…

* * *

Arizona risked peeking out of the exam room. The corridor looked empty_-ish_. She didn't mind the nurses, the orderlies or the janitorial staff. Things with them were pretty status-quo; they'd leer and whisper, but they never asked her about any of it directly. But she did find that she had to constantly duck and hide from the rest of the board members. _'Survive a plane crash with a bunch of people and apparently they've all bought life-long passes to the front row seats to witness the drama in your life!'_

"Hey, Robbins!" came a loud and abrasive shout. _'Damn that man-boy!'_

She sighed and turned on her good leg, '_her only leg, really'_. "What is it Karev?" _'Ugh! She was saying his name in that annoyed mommy way where her voice would tapper off at the end! Obnoxious!'_ Her face matched her voice,_ 'what a treat?!'_

He didn't blame her though. Everyone from his Vulcan roommate to Bailey-the-busiest-boss-that-ever-lived, were constantly looking to _talk _to her! 'What the heck was the big deal anyway?! What did talking ever solve?!'

He stood in front of her, a little dazed at the look of pure disdain on her face.

She noticed that amusing twilight zone of Karev's facial expressions; he was torn between concern and confusion. She relaxed a little, _him_ she could handle - "just spit it out!" she wasn't harsh anymore, just drained, and it was showing – "you wanna _talk_ too?!"

"No! Robbins_, God no!"_ He said waving his hands once over, making a cross in the air.

She gave him her penchant 'speak idiot!' arched eyebrow look. "No? _You sure_? Because everyone and _their grandmother_ wants to talk to me!"

"Naah. Pass." He said with a shrug of his shoulders.

She looked at him with a burgeoning curiosity. 'He was her _'friend' _right? Sort of…he _was_ the only one giving her space. Alex could be sweet sometimes…'

Her internal monologue was cut short with a nonchalant – "not like talking's gonna help you un-screw Boswell!"

_'Riiiight…'_ "What a lovey sentiment!" She acerbically exclaimed, "now if you'll excuse me?" she turned to walk away…

"Gah!" A Christina Yang, in her face.

A creepy-honey-dripping-acidic-smile-vacantly-starin g Yang in her face - "Hello, Arizona… We_ need to_…"

"Get you to the ER!" Karev chimed in. She turned around again, this time to find him looking a little '_iffy'_, nervous almost as he rocked back and forth on the balls of his feet.

"You should've led with that, Karev!" she barked. But he knew - that she knew - that he knew that she was internally thanking him for his impeccable timing.

She started walking with him quickly.

"But what about our talk?!" came a shout from behind them.

She threw back - "a Sunday from never, Yang!" over her shoulders as she continued to walk towards the ER.

"So what's the case?"

"It's Torres."

She looked at him, a small and gratuitous smile creeping on to her face. He was trying to give her a chance to talk to her wife. They'd had time to cool off, the both of them. Yes it still stung, and it added to the pile of things they had to address. She'd been inconsiderate and desperate, and just hungry for a few words from her wife. She knew Callie and Jasper were just friends, she was just jealous that he got to make her laugh and she couldn't right now. But she also knew that Callie needed someone like that right now.

Callie was different. She and Callie, they were _very different_. She put up walls and moats and tuned everything out till the loud discontent of her heart and soul echoed throughout her being. And one day, the ghost of her unhappiness, evolved from tired melancholy, to a virulent and entrapped pain, till it banged at the edges of her consciousness and broke out in a white and blinding heat - pushing away those she loved. It always left her alone and spent; until Callie happened. But, that was before…

Callie was different; where Arizona folded in on herself in a tight and ugly clutter till the whole mess fell apart, Callie's pain sprang outward, passionate, roaring. When Callie was in pain, she looked to find love, and friendship and kindness, because that was what she was taught to give when she saw someone else in pain. There was never anything ugly about Callie. She could be loud, and she could be involved, and she could be pushy, but if you bled her - she'd bleed love.

"Karev…" she sighed, "it's nice of you to try and get us to talk…"

"No, no" he cut her off, "it's actually Torres!"

"What's actually Callie?" _'Ugh! Maybe Callie was right; he could be a big dumb Gorilla sometimes! Or maybe she was the gorilla, 'cause she took him under her wing and then lost a freaking leg!' _

"In the ER? Getting stitched up?" He asked all sing-song, looking at her like she'd lost her mind.

She took off immediately, shouting a "why didn't you say so you moron?!" the last syllable stretching in the air.

He just shrugged – "it's just a shiner!" He cupped his hands over his mouth, making sure she heard him "it looks kindda hot!"

* * *

Callie was sitting on a bed in the ER, having Avery stitch up her brow. _'God, this was so colossally stupid! Adultery and assault?! _When it came to her, everything in the hospital was always up on a bulletin board!'

The noise of shoes beating on the hospital floor drew her attention away from some extreme thumb twiddling action in her lap. As she looked up she felt a sharp tug at her skin and an unpleasant pain jolted through her entire face.

Arizona was standing at the doorway, bent at the waist, her hand on her knees, trying to catch her breath. As she looked up, she caught her wife's gaze.

"What happened?" She looked on, concerned. Not waiting for an answer or to be waved inside, she began walking in and surveyed the room. There he was, Jasper Callahan, sitting in the corner, looking extremely guilty.

She came up to Callie, just as Avery finished suturing Callie's brow and began to apply some protective padding at the wound site. She shooed him away, and without ceremony, took over the menial task.

"Callie…" she tenderly shifted to touch her wife's cheek, but at the slightest contact Callie flinched away.

Disappointed, but not deterred, she asked again in an even tone, this time arching her body towards her right and speaking to Callahan – "Dr. Callahan?"

The man looked up at her.

"Care to explain what happened to my _wife?_" there was an inexplicable bite in the last word, and it definitely had something to do with that suspiciously guilty look on the otherwise smug trauma surgeon's face.

"We were at Joe's." Arizona whipped her head back to her wife, her eyes wide with surprise. Callie was speaking to her.

"Alright?" _'Say something, just anything'_ – she'd missed _just_ listening to Callie speak.

"And this guy… he… he" she went silent, looking a little sheepish and awkward. She finally hazarded a look at Arizona. The blonde was looking at her, concerned and inquisitive.

"He wouldn't let up…"

"Let up what?" Arizona asked, losing patience, her mind was crowded with worry for her wife.

"He kept hitting on me, okay?!" Callie said, a little too loud for all their comfort.

"And then what?"

"He got…" Callie hesitated a moment longer but was determined to continue…"he got handsy…" She was going red _'of all the stupid things on this Earth, in the middle of all this, they got in a…'_

"A bar fight?!" Arizona roared, outraged when the realization hit her.

Callie ducked her head, '_God!_ If only the ground would open up and swallow her whole!' "You're telling me, my thirty…"

She heard the loud and scratchy noise of a throat being cleared effectively stopping her from blurting out Callie's age – _'Callie was picking now to be cute?!' _

"It's not her fault Doctor…" Callahan was met with a steely death glare…"Robbins", his voice seemed to die down and get lost in the recesses of his throat. "What happened next?" she asked turning back to look at her wife.

Before she could get an answer, they were interrupted by the nurse coming in with pain Killers for Callie. A consensual silence fell over the three of them. "There you go Dr. Torres", the nurse said handing Callie the pill while she smiled at her sweetly, too sweetly. Three pairs of eyes tracked the woman as she was leaving the room.

"Nice!" came Callahan's voice from the far side of the room.

"Ugh!"

"Shut up!" the two women said together, rolling their eyes.

"Continue" the blonde said curtly to her wife, dangerously polite.

"Then, nothing. Jasper stepped in and…"

Callahan cut her off quick – "I have a consult" – he got up to make a beeline for the door.

"Sit down Dr. Callahan!"

"How can someone so blonde be so… so scary?" he mused out loud as he found himself taking the seat like a reprimanded child asked to take a corner in a classroom.

That drew a satisfied smirk from the blonde. Giving Callie her attention again, she asked "you were saying?"

"Jasper defended my…" she grimaced – "tried to defend my honor " she trailed off. Arizona inhaled loudly, poised to ask the tight-lipped-two-man-circus another question, but Callie quickly cut her off.

"He went to throw a punch and tripped!" she could feel the beginnings of a fit of laughter and worked desperately to stop herself, laughing right now would hurt like a mother.

"Okay?"

"And the guy was kindda going to punch him at the same time, but Jasper slipped so…"

"So you obliged his fist with your face…" Arizona did that silent-mad eyes thing that always made Callie break into nervous a sweat.

"It's not like I was looking to get punched. He was a douche-bag! " She could be heard in the halls now. Jasper coward to the side of the room; he was flinching at how quickly this thing was escalating.

"You're a **_mother_** now, Calliope! You can't get in _bar fights!_"

"I wasn't _really_ in a bar fight!" Callie shrank back a little.

"You _just_ said you were! Don't talk us in circles!"

"There are a lot of things we shouldn't do because we're mothers now Arizona!" '_There! It was out in the open! She'd said it.'_

_"Not here!" _the blonde said in a terse and loud whisper.

"Fine, tomorrow then" Callie said, beginning to get up.

Arizona looked at her, flabbergasted – "oh no! You're coming home with me!"

The brunette looked at her like she'd grown two heads. She spoke, defiant, hands on her hips, standing a little taller – "and _why_ would I do_ that?!_"

Arizona looked stung and infuriated, "what do you _mean_ why?!"

"I'm not some damsel in distress; I don't need to be rescued! The last time someone tried" she comically waved at her bruised eye.

"Do you have a concussion?" Arizona asked standing up slowly.

"A mild one, what does that have to do…" As she looked at Arizona's perfectly arched eyebrow issuing her a silent challenge, she came to a slow realization and unhappy realization. A concussion would mean that she'd need monitoring. "I can go… ummm…" 'Fishing, Callie was fishing _really _hard right now!' "…I could stay with Bailey!" She exclaimed with a slight smile that turned into a grimace as the pain in her eye registered.

"I'm sorry Torres" Callahan's voice drew their attention – "you know she left to be with Ben, Tucker's with his dad for the weekend… so? You could come to my place?"

Callie saw the blonde's face drop instantly. The ice in her heart thawed a little. Their eyes met, and holding her wife's gaze she resigned herself to the fact that right now Arizona needed to be with her as much as she'd needed to be with Arizona.

"Naah! I've seen you're apartment buddy, you walk in with a concussion, and you walk out with bed bugs. No thanks! I'll pass!"

Callahan started to move to the door – "suit yourself Torres!"

Arizona turned back from watching Callahan leave. She took a look at Callie's face again. Callie could feel it. This was like one of those brief moments in their day that they'd remember and use in order to get through the rest of it. Arizona would look at her, and it felt as intimate as a breathless and desperate kiss. Her eyes would drink her in and everything outside of them would just… it would just fall away. Arizona's eyes welled up with tears as her hand traveled to Callie's injured brow. She risked it – touching Callie, she couldn't help herself. _'She never could.'_

Callie hissed again in pain, but her eyes remained open and locked on Arizona's; she didn't think to flinch away this time, the need to feel her wife getting the best of her, making her forget her anger.

Her sigh of pain caused Arizona to momentarily lose control and a few tears got away from her, but she recovered quickly, wiping at her face.

"So", Callie asked almost reaching for her wife's hand, but then stopping herself, it didn't go unnoticed by the blonde – "you wanna go get Sophia from day-care?"

"Yeah, let's go."

The two started walking together in a comfortable and familiar silence.

"Callie?"

"Yeah?"

"Will you do me a favor?"

"I'll think about it…"

"Next time you see two idiots about to start a rumble?"

"Hmmm?"

"Try not to stand around?" '_Smirking! Arizona was smirking!_'

"Sure. Sounds do-able."

They'd reached the entrance to the day-care now. Right before they were about to enter, Callie stopped to look behind Arizona and then moved to look back at her. The look Callie was giving her made the blonde a little anxious.

"What is it?"

"Have you noticed?" Callie looked behind Arizona yet again and made her turn around with a light push on the shoulder. "They're all looking at us."

There, standing right outside were Yang, Derek and Grey, with weird looks on their faces. _'What was Grey even doing there?! Wasn't she on maternity leave?!'_

"What's that about?" Callie asked, a little freaked by the entire crew of bug-eyed weirdos staring at them like they were alien clowns.

"Oh that?" Arizona smirked as she started walking past Callie and into the day-care center – "they just want to talk" – she said mysteriously.

* * *

**A/N 2.0: **Next up – Callie and Arizona talk.


	11. Chapter 11

**Disclaimer: **Not mine, any of them. Well, Dr. J. C is.

**A/N: The same person, presumably (that's what it feels like, I may be wrong) keeps sending me anonymous threats of _reporting_ me. One called me a 'retard'? I have family that is differently able, and 'retard' should not be used as an insult, because it's a genuine medical condition, one that people can't help! it's lame and insensitive.**

**I've deleted my 'attack' which by the guidelines at FF cannot be considered as one anyway, because you can't defame someone who is hidden and unnamed. But, I'd rather carry on writing without having to do _this. This is boring and exhausting and I'm over it. _**

**_I have deleted those reviews and now will continue to do so in silence. _**

**_Sincerely,_**

**_Pasha._**

I apologise to everyone else - that was a little ugly (on my part).

I hope the rest of you, new and old readers enjoy this chapter!

**Some Nicer Stuff** – to my new Follower 'MyAnatomy,' I love the handle! It gave me a good chuckle!

**Onward**

* * *

There is this feeling, and it's pretty indefinable. It seems to start at the pit of your stomach, in your toes, in the tips of your fingers, at the base of your skull… and it always spreads like a cold wild fire, changing everything inside you. It speeds everything up and slows everything down. People say its fear, but it's so much more than that. It's dread; it's a cold sweat that pre-tells an excruciating and irreplaceable loss. It forces its way into your consciousness and in that one moment everything turns on its head, and suddenly you can see, but you can't, and everything is white noise, screeching, halting, blank, endless… That's when you know it happened. Disaster crept up on you; you weren't looking 'cause you were the happy kid on the playground; the unsuspecting sap who thought _this_ happened to other people, _until_… until it happened to you.

* * *

Callie Torres could smell apples. Not the usual kind, they were the green ones that made her think about youth and frozen yogurt. Her nose twitched, something was lightly brushing it, tickling it. She fought it really hard, but she couldn't anymore – the brush was both pleasant and annoying. It pulled something from the recesses of her memory till she groggily opened her eyes and… comically gasped her surprise.

Arizona's face was hovering over hers. Wisps of her long hair played on Callie's face, the street lights bounced off of them creating a mesmerising sheen – something Callie had tried so hard to forget when she'd laid alone in bed for the past month and a half.

Arizona's eyes were doing that thing. They were as dark as the night sky, and shone like there were liquid embers in them.

"What are you doing?" Her face was so close; Callie's breath caressed the skin of her cheek.

"I'm… I just, I had a thing… and then I couldn't… and yeah." Arizona was flustered. A while back she wouldn't have thought anything of it. She was looking at her wife, and if they were _them_ she would have shamelessly kissed her wife. _Hard._ And _things _would have happened…

Callie rubbed at her eyes, awkwardly pushing herself up on one elbow, the movement forcing Arizona to lean back and sit up – "Yes, stop being a well of information! I'm drowning!"

Arizona gave her a sheepish smile, like a kid caught with her hand in the cookie jar.

_"This isn't a sex thing, right?!"_ Callie asked, panicked and doubtful, her heart kicked it up - all systems go, full speed ahead, then it ended up stuck and thudding in her throat.

'What was that _look _on Arizona's face?! _Guilt? Disappointment? What?_'

"No, no! I just…" she pointed to their once bedroom. Callie had insisted that she'd take the couch outside, concussion or no concussion. Arizona couldn't be expected to sleep on the couch with her leg and the fact that it'd give her a bum back the next morning. So, Callie took the couch, and now Arizona woke her up, sitting on the coffee table, looking at her all creep-tastic like.

"Uff!" Callie groaned as she pushed herself up, now on both elbows. She scooted up to sit on the couch with her back resting on the arm rest. '_God!_ She felt so… so _old._ She felt old in her achey-breaky bones!' She giggled a little at herself; to herself.

"What?" Arizona asked her, a slight and amused smirk on her face. She knew _what_. Callie had most likely thought of something. Then she'd thought it was funny, but it probably actually wasn't, because her wife was a cute, lame_ adorkable_ weirdo when you woke her before she got her seven hours of slumber.

"Nothing." Callie was giving her that _look_ and it said 'moment's over, come clean, _now!_'

She sighed. There was no avoiding this. The talking! It had to happen and she _had to _be honest and open, and all that other annoying sentimental crap that Dr. Wissack told her she had to be. It was annoying, and it wasn't her, but then she looked at her wife's face – Callie looked curious, like she was puzzle solving or something and 'adorkable', and she knew she had to do it…_'be honest, because you love this woman. And you fucked up, so fix it. Be honest!'_

She brought her hands together, intertwining her fingers, it gave her something to do with them as she leaned forward and made sure to catch and keep Callie's gaze. "I had a nightmare…"

There was a short but heavy silence, and it lingered till the brunette spoke up – "the plane…"

Arizona quickly cut her off - gesturing in the negative, moving her head from side to side – "that's not it… I…"

Callie sat up straighter, all the sleep drained from her eyes. She just now realised it, but her head was swimming a little, and she felt incredibly hot; she threw the light sheet that draped her body and quickly swung her legs to the ground.

"What happened?" Arizona asked – scared, concerned. She saw the brunette trying to stand and hurriedly put her hands on Callie's knees and pushed back. "Don't", she shook her wife's knee a little trying to get her attention – "just tell me what it is! _Please?"_

Callie took in a deep breath, desperately trying to calm herself; she looked at Arizona and momentarily cupped a hand on her mouth. The dizzy and disorienting feeling passed as Arizona kept lightly moving her hands over her knees in small circles. Callie brought her hand back to the edge of the couch cushion, holding it firmly and anchoring herself. Her posture looked strained to Arizona, but she stopped herself from saying anything. She could hear her shrink talking to her in head _'give her time, it'll take time, but don't give her too much space. She doesn't sound like she appreciates too much space…'_

"Can you just…" there it was again, a slight and pinching pain behind her eyes…"can you get me a glass of water please?" She breathed it out slow - like the air pressure around them had improved and she could finally draw a breath.

"Yeah…" – Arizona sounded hesitant; like she didn't want to leave Callie long enough to get her a freakingglass of water. Seeing the concern and uncertainty etched on the blonde's face made her heart melt a little, but she also felt a weird, painful little tug in her chest – _'why'd something always have to happen for Arizona to love her? Why couldn't they just… just be?! Why couldn't they just be in love?!"_

She was pulled out of her _'why doesn't Arizona…'_ reverie (there were so many of them these days) when a glass of water was thrust in front of her face with a light and whispered – "here you go."

"Thanks" – she stopped to take a sip, the water going down her throat a little painfully. She looked up to find Arizona's intense gaze locked on her. The blonde was tracking her every move. She leaned forward, bending a little to keep the glass on the table on which Arizona was seated. That annoying feeling of being constantly observed like she was suddenly going to explode or drop dead finally got to her. Still leaning forward – "Arizona…" she sighed her annoyance into that one word.

"_I know, I know…_" Arizona backed off a little – "hey! I know, _okay?_ I get it."

More silence followed as they awkwardly looked around the room, when Callie suddenly remembered – "will you tell me?"

The vulnerability with which the question was asked surprised the blonde.

"Tell you what, _Calliope?_" Arizona had wanted to say her name all the time._ 'She wanted to laugh it out, sigh it, say it in cracking fervid whispers under rustling sheets, say it when she held her hand, when she'd get her attention to give her a cup of coffee. That's all she ever wanted to say ever again.'_

Callie made that weird clicking sound that let the blonde know she was annoyed with her – "what the nightmare was about? I mean, if it wasn't the plane…" she took a breath to center herself …"then what was it?"

"Yes…" Arizona visibly paled. Callie scooted forward and was about to take the blonde's hands in her own, but she hesitated and fisted up the frumpy cloth at the knees of her wife's pyjamas.

Arizona looked down at the hand that touched her prosthetic. Callie couldn't tell what her wife was thinking, her face hidden from view, and she began to withdraw that hand.

Arizona, sensing her wife's discomfort and the beginnings of a hesitant withdrawal, quickly but gently put her hand on Callie's, squeezing it for comfort and keeping it in place.

Callie's heart sped up again as she looked up to catch Arizona's eyes. Her eyes were swimming with tears, and as she sniffled, they escaped and fell to meet at her chin.

When things were good between them, when they were happy, Callie had always imagined that one day they'd have a little blonde haired, blue eye terror who'd be brave most of the times, and defend other kids on the playground and such things. She'd ride her bike too fast, and she'd never sleep at bed time, she's loathe green vegetables… but when they'd get home from a bad day she'd smile at them, and ask them weird awkward questions and show them meaningless crayon squiggles and all the 'ugly' in the work would just disappear for a while. Because she would be theirs; hers and Arizona – just like Sophia. And on very, very rare occasions, when her little heart would ache over something, she'd come to her mothers, she'd cry and she'd sniffle – that's how her tears would fall and meet at her chin – like Arizona's were now, 'cause she'd have Arizona's chin.

The thought made Callie's chest feel hollow – 'that'd probably not happen anymore, even if they got back together. _What if it'd always be on shaky ground? What if it was never like it was before, what if it was like that creepy weak looking shadow Voldermort they saw at the end of that Potter film?! She couldn't… they shouldn't bring another kid into that! God!_ The concussion was maybe getting to her, a little… maybe.'

Arizona taking in a shallow, shuddering breath through her mouth got her back to reality.

"It wasn't the crash… for the first time since it happened, I… I dreamt of something that wasn't the crash or…" Arizona stopped again, hesitating, but Callie got her meaning and finished her sentence for – "crash adjacent."

"Yes, it was… you." She finished lamely, hoping that was enough. Hoping Callie would get that and make no further enquires, but…no such luck.

"Me? Me what, Arizona? Come on! Okay!?" she looked at her incredulously – "you were creep-sleep-watching me, I don't even know for how long, and you _wanted_ me to wake up…" she heard Arizona gasp; she was getting armed to protest and cut her off with impressive speed – "Oh! Don't even!"

"Don't even deny it! You want to talk, so stop skirting around it and talk! I swear sometimes you mumble like a vapid teenager! I don't get it…" somewhere in the middle, an earnest request for conversation had turned into an angry rant about the blonde's usual quiet and lack of communication.

_'Yeesh!_ Put an end to _that,_ Robbins! _Right now!' – _"I was watching you breathe." - It was a meek and near quiet admission, a confession that she wouldn't usually part with.

Callie didn't miss it; she heard it – it was the closest Arizona had come to saying 'I love you' to her in the longest time ever. _'That's what this was. That's what those words meant. They were hidden and disguised, but they were there, because Callie could hear them – quiet, but clear. That was an I love you.'_ - "What?" the word rushed out of Callie's chest, mingled with a weak and shallow breath and disappeared in the air.

Arizona spoke a little louder, 'Callie had to hear this' – "I was watching you breathe! With today and the ER…"

"It's just a scratch though…" the brunette chimed in. Unbeknownst to Callie, _that_ was the wrong thing to say.

"Just a scratch?! It's not just a scratch! How do you know it's just a scratch?! You could have clots…" the sheer charge and ferocity with which she pointed the questions at Callie made her shrink back.

"Arizona, come on… don't…" she huffed – "You'll wake Sophia…" '_terrible, terrible defence._ That was deplorable!', but then she had no clue where the blonde was going with this.

Arizona hazarded a look at their daughter's room. They both knew that the chances of waking Sophia were, _"huh!"_ she scoffed – _'miniscule.'_ She gave Callie a pointed glare, but then it changed into this look of utter _'what was that? Concern? Fervour?' _whatever it was, it only served to confuse the brunette even more.

Arizona recognised the look of _extreme, extreme_ confusion on her wife's face – "you really don't know what I'm talking abou…"

She was cut off in the middle – "I _am _mildly concussed, and _maybe_ a little hung-over … I don't know. But… just tell me okay, it's four in the AM Arizona!" she stage whisper-whined, 'yeah it warranted being said again'…"four in the AM!"

"We never do anything half assed! We break-up the first time – be wawy wawy quiet – I thot I saw a doctor dude – looney tunes – gunman! We break up again…"

"Uh!_ Unilateral…_" Callie sing-songed.

Arizona went on, sparing her a glare – "_we_ break-up again, it's all continental drift! You sleep with Mark and get pregnant, and then you almost die and _she_ almost dies." She pointed to Sophia's room. _"My kid! My wife!"_

She stopped and took a shuddering breath, trying to compose herself, covering her face with her hands.

Callie couldn't take it anymore. She knew this was important, that this was her wife breaking the right way, so that the mend would be right too. But, this – the gut wrenching silent sobs that her wife was trying to stifle; she could see her lose her breath, and she couldn't not touch her. 'Yes, a part of her hated Arizona right now, the woman gave her everything and then when the crap hit the fan, she took it all away and left this huge-ass empty void inside her… But, Arizona was… she was _lost_, and she…_they _were trying to find their way back. So she couldn't not touch her.'

She got off the couch and sat between the blonde's legs. She noted how her back ached but chose to ignore her old creaking bones. Hesitating some – she put both her hands on the blonde's waist…_"Arizona…"_ she's said it like it was the only word she'd known, like it was the only word she'd ever needed to know.

She staggered back a little, surprised as a familiar pair of lips slowly but forcefully assaulted hers.

As much as Callie wanted this, _wanted her_… it felt…_wrong_. She gently pushed her wife away resting a hand in the middle of her wife's chest; both of them were taking laboured breaths.

"Arizona…" she whispered so low she wasn't sure she'd be heard – "don't."

Arizona slowly opened her eyes and brought a hand up to her lips, the other resting on Callie's shoulder; she looked dazed for a second, but quickly recovered as her brain caught up with her body. She looked almost afraid.

Callie put her other hand on the blonde's cheek. 'Maybe…sometimes… sometimes they were _them_, it'd happen someday. This will all still be there, the fact that it happened, that it changed everything, that it was a hurt that they felt in their bones… _both of them_. But, _maybe_ it won't matter so much, as much it did right now.'

She made sure Arizona was looking at her, hearing her before she spoke – "someday, okay? Someday. We'll… we'll be together again, and we'll…" she blushed, but she soldiered on – "we'll kiss like that. And we'll be slow and we'll be fast, and we'll be everything." Arizona gave a wide and wet smile, even now, in the dark Callie could see a light blush creeping up her pale and exposed neck – "We'll be everything together. But, not like this, okay? Please?" Callie was pleading with her now.

Arizona lurched forwards, encircling Callie's shoulders with her arms as she broke down in loud and heart breaking cries. She kept repeating "I'm sorry, I'm _so_ sorry…" like a mantra and Callie held her till it passed. The brunette squeezed her harder – "you better now?"

"Yeah…" Arizona sighed, drained.

They broke apart again, but this time they held hands, both unwilling to lose tactile contact with one another.

"Arizona?"

"Yeah?" she looked up, a little taken aback by that - _'was that a smirk on Callie's face?'_

"So?" – Callie sounded almost glib and dangerously pleased with herself – "I was right? Right?"

The blonde felt more and more confused. She must have been missing something.

"Right about what, Callie?" she asked suspiciously.

"This _was_ a sex thing!"

"Ugh!" the blonde pushed her – "shut up!"

"Say it! Say it! You want me!" Callie sing-songed in a trill annoying tone – what she '_thought_' was a _girly_ tone.

"I do." Arizona answered seriously, and with such sincerity that it brought the light joking atmosphere Callie had established to an end. The air between them changed again.

"Why did you do it then? _Cheat?_" Callie asked. There was something venomous in that last word, and it was about to poison the air between them.

They were in the thick of it now...

* * *

**A/N 2.0:** It isn't exactly the talk I promised, but we're getting there. There'll be a few more chapters and then I'll wrap it up with an epilogue shaped bow!

Longest Chapter Yet!

Cool? Cool!

Sorry again to the rest of you who have been so kind and encouraging.


	12. Chapter 12

**Confessions, Concessions & Cures**

**Chapter Twelve **

**Disclaimer: **Not mine, any of them. Well, Dr. J. C is. All characters belong to **ABC** and **SR.** I make no profit. No copyright infringement intended.

**A/N:** Here it is folks, another update. Sorry for having had neglected this Fic for so long, but I have been writing the other one. I'll be updating** TMTC** soon, as it is with my Beta, _Dwarkwlight7. _This chapter is un-Beta'd because I just wanted to get it out, 'cause it's been so long! So any and all mistakes are mine.

Let me know how you like it, this was hard to write because I have the emotional maturity of a banana leaf. Why a banana leaf, you ask? Because I'm a complex human being with inexplicable choices. So anyway, yeah, hard to write!

Also chill about the spellings, Indians use Brit. English.

**Onward**

* * *

_Just To Jog Your Memory_

* * *

"Arizona?"

"Yeah?" she looked up, a little taken aback by that - _'was that a smirk on Callie's face?'_

"So?" – Callie sounded almost glib and dangerously pleased with herself – "I was right? Right?"

The blonde felt more and more confused. She must have been missing something.

"Right about what, Callie?" she asked suspiciously.

"This _was_ a sex thing!"

"Ugh!" the blonde pushed her – "shut up!"

"Say it! Say it! You want me!" Callie sing-songed in a trill annoying tone – what she '_thought_' was a _girly_ tone.

"I do." Arizona answered seriously, and with such sincerity that it brought the light joking atmosphere Callie had established to an end. The air between them changed again.

"Why did you do it then? _Cheat?_" Callie asked. There was something venomous in that last word, and it was about to poison the air between them.

They were in the thick of it now...

* * *

_Now for the New Stuff_

* * *

"I don't wanna talk about it right now…" She whispered.

"You don't want to talk… _I don't even!_" She huffs, takes a deep breath and gathers herself, 'she could throttle her right now; she _should_ throttle her right now!' - "what makes you think _you_ get to choose?!"

"Callie…" she breathed out in a desperate sigh. All thought of sleep, and sex and everything else had left them now.

Callie would rarely ever get angry. Sure, she'd crib and growl and whine; she'd do all of that. But, even through all this, this entire last year, she'd really only lost her temper in that heart breaking sort of way three times, and just the once after the Lauren.

"_Say something, _Arizona!"

The brunette's pleas were met with silence – dark, heavy, abject, interminable silence.

"I beg you! I'm still begging! I'm always the one left begging – even now…"

Arizona looked at her, holding in her tears, biting her lip. She was bursting to talk, _'she was!' _But they couldn't have a blowout, they couldn't afford one right now. They needed a controlled setting.

"This was a mistake…" Callie said dejectedly as she began to get up.

Arizona's eyes traced her slow deliberate movements, _'wait what was happening here?!'_

"_What… wait! What are you doing?!_"

"I'm going back to..."

Arizona cut her off quickly, "Callie, this is your apartment! It's past four in the morning! Just, just…"

"What Arizona?" she whispered with a sob, "just what?! You're effacing me in all this! _You_ don't wanna talk, well good, 'cause guess what?! I don't want to hear it anymore!"

The blonde moved quickly to block Callie's lack lustre attempt at getting off the couch and out the door – "No, Callie! Come on, _wait_…" – she put a hand on the brunette's shoulder only to be shirked off unceremoniously.

_"Why should I? Why should I wait?!" _– The Cadence and pitch of her voice, evidence of her mood and control spiraling outward and away from her grasp, pushing her towards a jarring emotional incoherence and ineptitude she had worked so hard to avoid – "this is… its bullshit! I can't keep doing this with you, Arizona!

"I'm looking at you right now and…" – her voice tapered off as her anger gave way to a molten and soft, momentary silence, traversing the length between resentment and anguish.

"And what?" – The blonde whispered, uncertain if she really, actually wanted the answer.

"And I wish I felt nothing…" – Callie sobbed the words out as she threw herself back onto the couch, her hand on her forehead, the palm jutting onto her eyes as she tried to hide her tears.

_"Don't"_ – the blonde whispered – softly, lovingly, with concern etched on her face as she gently pried Callie's hand off of her eyes. She was afraid her wife would push her hand away again, and afraid she wouldn't. Callie's lack of resistance became harder to read – _'could her Calliope be pushed into being apathetic? Callie felt everything, sometimes all at once, she always had.'_

"Don't hide, Calliope, please."

"I'm not the one who's been hiding, Arizona."

They were quieter now, the both of them; they felt drained of energy and fight, but _this_ they needed to do. They understood that much.

"I know" –

- "You don't wanna talk?!" – the brunette cut her off quickly, suddenly feeling the need to give meaning and a voice to whatever it was that was stirring inside her – "Fine! Then I will!"

"Callie, please just…" –

- "No, no! You know what?! No! You've been lying to me for nearly a year now, Arizona! I feel… I feel, _God! _When you started to come around? Bailey's wedding day? I thought, there she is! Right there! She's been waiting to… _wanting to_ come back to me._ My wife! _It was all a lie… it's all been one big lie!" – She was crying now, controlled, suppressed, heavy, silent, broken cries; her fear, rage, heartache all distilled in the tears that she could no longer hold in.

"No!" – The blonde shook her head – "don't… don't say that!"

"It's true though!" - Rationality that Arizona so feared had made its way into Callie's voice – "no matter what you say, and how you… I feel…it's true. You've been lying this whole time! The truth is… some days you can't bear looking at me" –

"No!" – Arizona cut her off with a confidence that surprised the both of them – "that's not… maybe in the beginning…" – she whispered – "but not now. Not in a long while! I… I love looking at you!" – She said fervidly – "sometimes, it's all I want to do. Just look at you."

"Spare me the post-post-coital guilt goggles Arizona! You screwed that… that… walking swear-word of a person…" – she shocked them both with the lack of impropriety in this whole thing, Sofia was right there, separated from them by a thin door – "and you did it to feel… I don't know _what!_ But, you didn't come to me before it happened. I was walking around for months, happy like an idiot, thinking things were better; that we would… I don't know? That we would make it? That you loved me" –

- "_I do!_ I _do _love you!" – The blonde implored, a hand beating at her chest, as if to emphasise the depth of her love for her wife.

"This…" – Callie waved her hands between them – "this… it feels like a lot of things, but it doesn't feel like love to me, Arizona! Maybe we should just" –

"_Stop!_ Just… for the love of Pete, just stop, Callie! Stop before you say something you don't actually mean… that we won't be able to take back!"

There was a sudden lull between them as they both fidgeted with their hands, looking at the floor or around the room, avoiding each other's eyes.

Callie spoke first as she wiped at her cheeks, the palms of her hands rubbing hard against her face – "I need you to talk about it…" – she said tiredly, her breath coming slower now as she began to regain her calm – "I need to talk about it, Arizona! I feel like I'm going insane! Like 'm going to explode!"

"It's my recovery…" – Arizona replied softly, the edges of the words outlined by a muted anger.

"I'm sorry… _what?!_"

"_I said_…" – the blonde's voice became bolder, laced with an anger that was now more apparent and puzzling to the woman in front of her – "_it's my goddamn recovery!_ Not… not everything is about _you_!"

The change in Arizona's demeanor gave the brunette emotional whiplash. She couldn't really say a thing or present a counter point.

"I know that, I know it's your" –

"_Do you ?! Do You really?! _Because you've been so involved, and I… it's been… stifling" –

"_God!_ Nothing's changed! It's been a year, and nothing's changed. We're going to circle back to it, aren't we?! I'm the… the butcher that hacked off your leg!" – Arizona visibly shrunk at the words her wife hurled at her – "you always talked about it like I enjoyed it! Like I wanted to amputate! You aren't the only one this affects; you aren't the only one living with that decision!"

_"Don't!"_ – The blonde barked at her – "don't you dare! You were supposed to keep it; you were supposed to save it! I've seen you hand out _miracles _to perfect strangers! But, me?! You cut it off! You took it! You broke us!" – The room was engulfed in a rotting silence. It held within it the veritable quiet of a graveyard where the sweet smells of the wet grass and the wild flowers hid the stench of stale lifeless forms, breaking down and decomposing. And suddenly, they could both feel it… that thing between them… it was dying, gasping for breath, and life and light, and failing.

"How can you say those things and still say you love me?! What are we doing Arizona?" – The brunette lent forward, an intense insistence coloured her voice – "We should just… let's stop."

Arizona looked up at her, her chest and stomach in knots – "stop what?"

"Us."

"_No!_ No, we… I can't… I won't do that" –

"Why do you want to be with me? After everything, _why?"_

"Because…" – The blonde huffed her frustration – "because _this _will pass" – she made sure to maintain eye contact as she spoke again – "_it will_. Because, I don't feel like this all the time, and you do that too."

"What?" – Callie looked at her questioningly, prompting the blonde to explain further.

"What I mean is" – Arizona ventured a tight smile, trying to give her wife some semblance of reassurance – "I know what 'm doing! With therapy, I'm learning what I'm doing… 'm blaming you, because it's easier, because you'll" – she gulped, trying to control the lump that was beginning to form in her throat as her eyes stung again with the promise of tears – "you'll take it. You _always_ do, always have. But, I also… I… it's you I want to get better for… you and Sofia" –

Callie shook her head as if to say no – "you need to do it for yourself, Arizona, not for" –

"And I do!" – The blonde cut her off mid-sentence with a fervid insistence – "but, I have bad days, and you have to know that, and still stick around!"

"I want to" – Callie replied – "Arizona, you have no idea how much I want you" – she said quietly as she traced soft, shy patterns on the back of Arizona's hand, a gesture to make her feel safe – "but, you don't want me here! You" –

"I do!" – Arizona shrieked. The brunette replied with an arched eyebrow as if to say _'really?!'_

"I mean, not always. Sometimes… sometimes I need space, I need to" –

_"Run?"_ – The brunette asked – "you always run…"

"No, it's not running… I won't…it's just" –

"What?"

"It's clarity, it's peace, it's silence… most days I feel overwhelmed. You want to know why I slept with her?"

"To get away from me?" – Callie asked with a baffling smirk on her face. '_She was picking now to inject humour? Here?!'_

"It was a rhetorical question, Callie!" – said the blonde, sporting a smirk of her own. Then a heaviness overtook them – "We joked, and we laughed" –

"I… don't want to hear anymore!" – the brunette said hurriedly, as she sprang up and walked a little ways away, putting some distance between herself and her wife.

Arizona sighed – "yes you do. You need to… _we_ need to do this!" – She waited for Callie to say something, but was answered only with a silent and tentative nod.

"She was like me. Devil may care badass surgeon, with no one to answer to. She had nothing to do with this, _all this!_" – She flailed her hand around for emphasis – "The plane crash, Mark, the law suit, my leg; she was outside of it and I thought if I… if she and I… then I could forget too, for a while…" – her voice fell into a silence as they both absorbed what the blonde had admitted.

"So, _what?_" – The brunette asked, her indignation shining through her voice – "What are you trying to say to me? That… that it had nothing to do with me? That it wasn't _even_ about the sex?!"

"_No!_ I mean… yes, I mean yes _and_ no! I… Callie it's complicated!"

"Well, freaking simplify it! Are you still in love with me?"

"Indubitably"

Hearing Arizona's answer was causing the brunette to quickly lose steam -"then, I don't… I don't understand."

"_I_ did it, and I'm _still_ figuring it out, Callie. It's only been" –

- "I know how long it's been since you were with her, Arizona! Trust me, I can't forget…"

"Right…" – The blonde sighed – "yes, of course, I didn't mean… I only meant…" –

- "What? What? Just spit it out!" – The brunette asked, terse and harsh.

"I only meant that I _just _started getting help, you know?" – Hedged the blonde – "real psychiatric help, and the doctor said" – she paused the next part was indelicate and bound to rile up her wife – "the doctor said that PTSD can lead to acting out like I did, with…" –

- "_with sex!"_ – The brunette scoffed – "that's your defence?! That you did it because your" –

- _"Callie"_ – the blonde sighed, cutting her wife off before they went off topic – "I'm not defending what I did."

_"Sure!"_

"I'm not!" – Arizona insisted – "you wanted to understand… I'm explaining it. I'm trying to understand it too… I" –

"It made you forget…" – Callie stated in a quiet and thoughtful tone. Callie certainly understood the impulse; she'd done it herself, several times, especially with Mark. But, with one crucial difference –_ 'she wasn't in love and freaking married to someone else when they screwed!'_

"Hmmm?"

"The sex, with that woman…" – Callie sputtered, avoiding having to say Lauren Boswell's name – "you said sex with her made you forget about… about everything."

"Yes." – Came the blonde's meek, almost muted reply as she felt a deep and all engulfing shame swallow her whole.

"What about with _me?_"

"What do you… what do you mean?" – Arizona asked, her question laden with a hesitance that gave away her fear. She had a strong suspicion she wouldn't like where Callie was going with this.

"Sex with me? Were you…" – Callie's voice grew smaller as she moved ahead – "were you disgusted the whole time we were… we were making love? Were you thinking about how I took away your leg or that you were feeling less than… _just_… just less than yourself, and I did that! And you still had to touch me? Were you? Disgusted?"

Arizona was completely taken aback by the look of utter devastation on Callie's face. She could tell Callie was beginning to believe it… all this stuff about her being disgusted.

"Huh!" - Arizona laughed a dry laugh to herself, but stopped when she realised Callie was beginning to read her reaction incorrectly as panic flashed across the brunette's face.

"_No! Callie, come on! God no!_ Sex with you was… it was" – she went red, her reaction eliciting a smile from her partner – "…yeah. If anything, I didn't know how after everything I'd said, you could…" –

"Okay" – the brunette whispered, nodding her understanding – "okay" – she sighed.

"But was she… was she better than" –

"We are not doing that, now!" – Arizona hissed, feeling a little sick – "we aren't doing that ever! I made a mistake… it was a mistake… with her" –

Callie scoffed, rolling her eyes at the blonde.

- "_I know!" _– Arizona spoke, insistence in her voice – "I know it sounds trite… that it's not a big enough word for what I did… I… I know that, but… that is what it was. I want you! Callie? Please look at me!" – She insisted.

The brunette refused to look up.

"Please." – Arizona sighed.

"What?" – The brunette asked her in a low murmur as she finally looked into her eyes.

Arizona smiled tentatively – "you are intelligent, and beautiful, and annoying, and bat-shit crazy" – Callie quirked an eyebrow, slightly amused, even though tears flowed freely from her eyes – "and you are brave… So brave, it's stupid" –

- "I thought you were trying to make a case for yourself" – the brunette cut her off – "you are terrible at this!" – She babbled – "the Robbins speechifying is a little rust-mmmmm!" – Her words quickly turned into a delicate and surprised moan of satisfaction as Arizona cut her off with a slow, languid kiss.

When Arizona withdrew, they both sighed as they wore matching grins on their faces.

Callie spoke first – "you" – she huffed, trying to catch her breath, she put her fingers on her lips, still feeling the warmth of Arizona's lips on hers – "you shouldn't have done that."

"Yeah, well…" – the blonde smirked – "some things work better with a demonstration."

"Yeah?" – Callie asked; a playful lilt in her voice.

"Mmmhmmm… that was an excellent teaching moment for me_… I think!_"

"Rigth!" – A long but comfortable silence followed as the two thought about all that had gone on between them.

Callie was the first to break the silence again - "this doesn't mean…" –

- "I know…" – Arizona nodded, an earnest smile on her face – "but you have to know that… that I love you!" – She cried, though that tentative and slow smile never left her face.

"I know… I do!" – The brunette insisted – "but I…" –

"I'll keep saying it… I will, till you get bored of it!" – Arizona promised.

"That's your sales pitch?!" – Callie laughed a wet laugh – "You'll bore me with love!"

"No one will ever bore you more than me!" – Arizona smiled.

"Arizona?"

"Yeah?"

"I bore you too."

"I know. I'm easy to bore!" – The blonde smirked.

"Yeah…" – Callie laughed – "on most days." – She sighed as the two held one another's gaze.

* * *

**A/N:** I wonder if this is a good place to end? Or if I should continue…

Write in with your opinions. Although, I could definitely keep going, but I like the whole open-ended-ness.


	13. Attention Readers

I'm putting this story on hold due to time constraints and the fact that my brain can handle just one story at a time. This processor is working at maximum capacity. Work and life have gotten very busy.

I will get back to it. Just not sure when. Till then, keep a look out for my other FF - 'The More Things Change,' which is active.

Sincerely,

Pasha.


	14. Author's Note

Hey everyone,

I just got a job and am starting pretty soon. Since it's a teaching position at a college, I won't be updating very often. In fact it may be a long time till my next Fic is out (work is already so busy, and I haven't even given a single lecture!), so I thought it best to inform you all.

Professor, Out!


End file.
